Unlike April, May was a pretty good reading month rating-wise, so I'm super excited to talk to you about all of the books I read in this month.
Starting off, I read a total of 10 books. Yes, this is less than in April, but the page count totally makes up for it because in May I read a total of 2,841 pages. At this point, I'm doing quite well in making headway towards reaching my goal of reading a total of 30,000 pages in the year.
In May I also focused more on books I owned, as only 4 out of the 10 books were borrowed from the library. This is totally due to the fact that I reread a total of 5 books this month, which also was good in helping me finish a series. But, I also finished a second series. I'm also pretty proud of the fact that I read 8 books written by female authors (even though I'd ideally want it to be split 50-50, if it is going to be skewed one way, I'd rather it be towards female authors). May, what a reading month it was!
In terms of genres, I read 1 science-fiction, 1 thriller, 1 suspense, 2 fantasies, and a whopping 5 contemporaries (if you read my April 2019 Reads post, you can guess what those contemporaries were). As for reading level, I read 4 adult, 4 young adult, and 2 middle grade books; this is much better in terms of diverse reading level than what I did in April.
Finally, for ratings, I had 5 five stars, 4 four stars and 1 three star. Pretty good reading month I'd say, right?
With these stats out of the way, let's get into the books!
30. Necessity by Jo Walton
So I'm starting out with a book I can't really tell you much about... This is the third and final book in Jo Walton's Thessaly series, the first being The Just City and the second being The Philosopher Kings. Before I get into my feelings on Necessity, I want to emphasize the fact that this series is absolutely AMAZING and if you enjoy philosophical books or Plato's Republic, you HAVE to read this series.
With that said, unfortunately I did not enjoy Necessity as much as the previous two books. I won't go into details because spoilers, but this book went in a direction that I didn't really care for, namely it went a little too science-fictiony for my tastes. For that reason I had to bump this down to an A- rating.
31. Roadwork by Richard Bachman (aka Stephen King)
Roadwork, while not the next Stephen King book in publication order, was contained in the same bind up as Rage and The Long Walk, so that's why I picked it up next. I really enjoyed this short story because it commented on social issues without being overly vulgar, something that the previous two books did not do. Additionally it dealt with topics that I could sympathize with.
In Roadwork, we follow George Bart Dawes as his life is basically falling apart in every way possible: family, home, career, all are imploding. Because of this, George understandably goes crazy, but acts it out in a negative way, as you can imagine with it being a Stephen King book. Like I said, the story was good, my only issues with it being that it hit a little too close to home for me, and had some minor editorial errors. So, I gave it a B-.
32. The Running Man by Richard Bachman (aka Stephen King)
Finally, I came to the end of this Bachman bind up, with The Running Man. I think, after having completing these short stories, that this was my favorite of the four. This is a somewhat dystopian thriller where the world sucks, so, to try to get money for his family, Ben Richards signs up to be on the #1 reality tv show, The Running Man. Basically, the contestant of this show needs to survive for a certain number of days as a group of people are trying to literally hunt him down. This isn't contained in a studio, but is played without bounds in the open world. Like I said this is my favorite, but I wanted to return to a point that I had brought up when discussing Rage. I don't understand why Rage is not being reprinted, when this story, which has a 9/11 World Trade Center-like scene in it, still is. Not that I'm saying this should not be read, but I just don't understand how people would have problems with Rage and not with The Running Man, you know what I mean? If you're going to 'ban' one story because of the bad, triggering content, don't you think you should at least be consistent? That's why I find it strange the Rage is not being reprinted, I think it should be. But that's a tangent for another day. I ended up giving The Running Man a B-.
33. The Second Summer of the Sisterhood by Ann Brashares
It's no surprise that I decided to continue on with the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants series after devouring the first book. I really have nothing much to add that I didn't already say in my post about The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants; I thoroughly enjoyed this reread, giving it an A+, and so...
34. Girls in Pants: The Third Summer of the Sisterhood by Ann Brashares
...I also read the third book, giving it an A+...
35. Forever in Blue: The Fourth Summer of the Sisterhood by Ann Brashares
...as well as the fourth book, ditto with the A+...
36. Sisterhood Everlasting by Ann Brashares
...and I even reread the fifth book, which was both written and set quite a bit after the original four books. This one I've only read once before, and even though I remembered that this was an emotional read, it totally made me bawl my eyes out again, even though I knew what was coming. A+ rating for sure. I absolutely love this series, and if you haven't picked it up yet, what are you doing? Pick it up! (I recommend doing so in the summer!)
37. Marilou is Everywhere by Sarah Elaine Smith
This was an ARC I was given by my local bookstore, and unfortunately I did not enjoy it. I have to say, I was confused by this book; I have no idea why it was written. In this, a girl from a poor family, whose parents aren't really around, decides to take the place of a missing, rich, older girl. Apart from that...there was really nothing else: no plot, character development, or interesting setting. Absolutely nothing.Even the writing style wasn't that great. So, like I said, I have no idea why Marilou is Everywhere was written, and so I gave it a C-.
38. Princess Academy by Shannon Hale
Similar to the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, Princess Academy was a book that I had read years ago and really loved, despite the fact that I thought it ended rather abruptly. Then, recently, I come to find that the reason why this book ended so unsatisfactory was because it was the first book in a trilogy. So, obviously, I had to reread this book in order to find out what happened next.
This follows Miri, a teenager from a quarrying mountain village who finds her and her fellow teenage village girls swept away to attend a princess academy. The reason? One of them will be lucky enough to marry the prince of this kingdom.
I can't really explain why I loved this story so much, but I did, and upon reread, I still do, even though this is intended for a much younger audience than myself. So, I gave this a B.
39. Palace of Stone by Shannon Hale
After finishing Princess Academy, I had to continue on; I waited sooo many years to know what happened next, so I wasn't going to delay it much longer. I won't go into much detail about Palace of Stone because it is a sequel, but I did enjoy it, though not as much as the first. I gave it a B.