**Another month, another pile of books thrown haphazardly on my table. The ones that I threw there that I read this month from my spot standing in front of the bookshelf. Once I have the last book, I organize the books into a nice stack and arrange them in the order I read them. A knock sounds at the door. I hop up and go to the door and let in my friend Betty, standing there in her green, flowing dress, a picnic basket in the crook of her arm. Today, Betty and I were planning on having lunch and discussing our June reads. I invite her in and she sets up her books on the table, and we talk about the books we read and what we thought.**

Somehow, I actually kind of stuck to my June TBR. I usually don’t make them, and when I do have a book or two I want to read in a month, I usually don’t read them. I end up changing my mind and reading something else, but I read a decent amount of the books on my TBR. Granted, I didn’t read them all and chose to read others, but I still read some. So let’s get into it.

• #1 – Never A Hero by Vanessa Len

The first book I finished in June was Never A Hero by Vanessa Len. This is the second book in the Monsters series, starting with Only A Monster. This series follows Joan, who is a monster, and the boy she likes is a monster hunter. This series has action and time travel, and is really fun to read. I gave Never A Hero a 3.5/5 stars. It took quite a while to get into the story, but once I hit about halfway or so, it really felt like it picked up a bit. I started to enjoy it a lot more and really love the magic system in the book. It’s such a unique story and I really enjoyed this one.

Rating:

• #2 – Opal by Jennifer L. Armentrout

The next book I read in June was Opal by Jennifer L. Armentrout. This is the third book in the Lux series which follows Katy and her alien neighbors. Seeing as this is the third book, I don’t want to say too much. I gave this one 3.5/5 stars. I always find these books very quick and fun and I really enjoy reading this series. I thought that the story picked up and continued in a great direction and a lot happened. I really enjoyed the ending and it set it up for the next book very well.

Rating:

• #3 – The Cursed Library Prelude by Jaime Lee Rotante

After that, I read The Cursed Library Prelude by Jaime Lee Rotante. This is one of the ones I got from Free Comic Book Day and picked it up for the cover. And the fact that there were books and the word library was on the cover. This is such a short comic that I don’t really know how to describe it. I’m also not going to put my rating here because it doesn’t seem fair to rate something so short. I did like the cover though. 

• #4 – Origin by Jennifer L. Armentrout

The next book I read was Origin by Jennifer L. Armentrout. I usually don’t read sequels right away, but I couldn’t stop thinking about the series after reading Opal so I decided to pick it up. With this one, I rated it 3/5 stars. I think that the direction of the story in the beginning was a great turn and it was entertaining, but I didn’t feel the same about this one compared to the rest. This is the first book where we get Daemon’s perspective, which I do think was a good choice with how the story went. I just think that the story dragged a bit and it felt like nothing new was happening after a bit. Then at about the half-way or two-thirds mark, I started to get a bit bored. I feel like in this one the relationship was a bit too developed. I’m someone who usually likes the before better, and don’t really care once the couple is more established, so I felt like I couldn’t enjoy it as much. It also felt like the romance was trying to push its way to the front, when it really should have been in the back more considering the circumstances. There is also one thing that happens with a character that made me really mad, but I can’t say it because that goes into spoiler territory. Overall, this was my least favorite in the series so far but I still enjoyed it.

Rating:

• #5 – It’s Not Summer Without You by Jenny Han

Either after or during my time reading Origin, I started listening to the audiobook for It’s Not Summer Without You by Jenny Han. I read To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before by her in 2017 and really enjoyed it, so I finally picked up The Summer I Turned Pretty last year. Unfortunately, I didn’t really like it, but I decided to try the second one still, so I picked it up on audio so I could do some reading while journaling. I usually don’t listen to, or even like, audiobooks, but I figured it’s something to listen to and I didn’t love the first book anyway, so why not? I ended up giving this sequel 2/5 stars. I just can’t get into the series. It’s basically about a girl named Belly who spends time at a beach house with her family and her mom’s friend’s family. The story follows Belly as she navigates a love triangle between the two brothers. I find Belly to be an immature, kind of annoying main character, and I don’t really care for any of the other characters or the story. While I was listening to It’s Not Summer Without You, I realized that it felt like reading someone’s diary. The story goes back and forth between timelines in a way that doesn’t really flow for me. I can’t fully describe it, but it really does feel like reading a diary. And in case anyone is wondering why there is no picture for this book, it’s because I only use pictures I take myself, in case of copyright and plagiarism issues.

Rating:

• #6 – Deadly Little Scandals by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

Next up, I read Deadly Little Scandals by Jennifer Lynn Barnes. I read Little White Lies, the first book in this duology, in March, and thought it was just okay. It was a lot of rich people drama with scandals and blackmail, and I didn’t like it as much as her other series, but I was still interested to read the sequel. I felt like Deadly Little Scandals was kind of similar. Until the last third or so. This book got so good as I got farther into it, and I liked this one better than the first. There were so many twists and the suspense really built. This was originally going to be rated the same as the first book, but when I finished it, I realized I liked it more, so I rated this 4/5 stars.

Rating

• #7 – Disney Villains: Maleficent by Soo Lee

My library does a summer reading challenge over the summer, where you read books to fill out tickets, so I have been trying to read more books to fill out the tickets, so I ended up reading a comic. I read the Disney Villains: Maleficent comic, one I picked up from Free Comic Book Day. I liked the illustrations of this one along with the atmosphere. It’s such a short story that I can’t judge it too much, so I won’t rate it.

Those are all of the books I read in June. I read a lot more than I thought I would, so it was nice to be able to get some extra books read. Let me know what books you read in June. Thanks for reading!

xoxo,

Just another reader