**Reading Experience: A Month of September**

As I reflect on my reading experience for the month of September, I must say that it was a mixed bag. The first book I read was "The Citadel" by Chelynn Thaiss and Smart, which was unfortunately not one of my favorites. This book had all the makings of an exciting story: revenge, war, and royalty. However, upon closer inspection, I found the magic system to be shallow and lacking in development. The core of the magic system relied heavily on metals, with characters able to hone their skills through practice and expel magic into the world. While this concept had potential, it ultimately fell flat for me.

One of the biggest issues I had with "The Citadel" was the pacing. The book started off well enough, but quickly became bogged down in a slow and dragging middle section. The author seemed to lose steam midway through, resulting in a lackluster experience that left me feeling unengaged. To make matters worse, the romance aspect of the story was nonexistent, which I found particularly disappointing. In many cases, romance is used as a tool to create conflict or add depth to characters, but in "The Citadel", it felt forced and unnecessary.

On the other hand, my next read was "Mistborn" by Brandon Sanderson, which I had previously mentioned. While it wasn't part of the original plan to re-read this series, I decided to do so after finishing "The Citadel". Reading "Mistborn" was a welcome respite from the disappointment that was "The Citadel", and it served as a reminder of why I love Sanderson's work in the first place. The world-building in "Mistborn" is top-notch, with a complex magic system that draws heavily from metals and alloys.

Unfortunately, the transition to "Which Stepped In Gold" by Chelynn Thaiss was not easy for me. The two books had similar magic systems at their core, which made it difficult for me to shake off the feeling of familiarity. As I delved deeper into the story, I found myself constantly drawing comparisons between the two books, which ultimately detracted from my reading experience.

The main plot of "Which Stepped In Gold" revolves around Arreya, a warrior who has spent most of her life in a cell, and Jasmine, the daughter of the Empress Queen-like figure known as the Doyen. Both characters have different motivations for seeking revenge against the Doyen, which creates an interesting dynamic between them. However, despite my best efforts, I struggled to connect with either character, particularly due to their similar voices being hard to distinguish from one another.

In terms of world-building, "Which Stepped In Gold" fell short in some areas. The magic system, while intriguing at first glance, ultimately felt shallow and underdeveloped. The author's attempt to create a complex web of magic was admirable, but it lacked depth and consistency. The pacing issues I mentioned earlier also plagued this book, with the middle section dragging on for far too long.

**Overall Experience**

In conclusion, my reading experience for the month of September was marked by disappointment in some areas and excitement in others. While "The Citadel" failed to live up to my expectations, it served as a reminder that even the most anticipated releases can fall short. On the other hand, re-reading "Mistborn" was a pleasure, and I'm grateful for the opportunity to revisit this beloved series.

If you're considering reading either of these books, I would recommend doing so with caution. While they have their moments, both "The Citadel" and "Which Stepped In Gold" struggled with pacing issues, shallow magic systems, and underdeveloped characters. However, if you do decide to give them a try, be prepared for an emotional rollercoaster and keep your expectations in check.

**Recommendations**

If you're looking for a compelling read that will keep you engaged from start to finish, I would recommend checking out "Mistborn" by Brandon Sanderson instead. This series is a masterclass in world-building, magic systems, and character development, with a richly detailed world that draws readers in from the very beginning.

For romance fans, I would suggest looking into other books that focus on relationships and character development. While romance can be a powerful tool in storytelling, it's not always necessary to have it featured prominently in a story. In some cases, it can feel forced or unnecessary, which was unfortunately the case with "The Citadel".

**Final Thoughts**

As I wrap up this article, I want to emphasize that reading is a personal experience, and what works for one person may not work for another. While "The Citadel" didn't quite live up to my expectations, it's still worth checking out if you're interested in revenge stories or fantasy novels. However, be aware of the potential pitfalls mentioned earlier.

If you have any thoughts on this article or would like to discuss your own reading experiences, please feel free to share them in the comments section below. Happy reading!

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enwhere did september go it feels like i filmed last year's september wrap-up yesterday but september was exactly what i needed it was a super refreshing month and i'm really excited to talk about everything that i read so let's get into it hello book reading friends welcome back to my channel or welcome if you're new my name is mel and today i bring you guys all the books i read in the month of september also known as my september wrap up it is honestly so wild to think about the fact that even though i already filmed my october tbr and this has already kind of sunk in that september's over september was a really great month in terms of balance and the books that i got to read i was also trying to get out of like a three week reading slump that i was just not in the mood to read and i was having the best time not reading but i was really struggling because i was like oh this book sounds so good let's read it and then i opened it and i couldn't get myself to read it and i couldn't push through and my main thing with september was i don't want to be reading 20 books a month anymore 20 books a month is like so outlandish i don't know if i could do it again at least not anytime soon and so i really reduced the amount of books that i was reading i was a lot more mindful with my reading and i was rather reading the books that i really really wanted to reach for and not things to kind of fill in of like oh my god i haven't really read that much let me squeeze in a comic or let me squeeze in a graphic novel or a volume or a short book or this or that i was really not in that mindset and it was so nice to not feel any sort of pressure mostly put in by myself to read anything and to really just reach for the things that genuinely sparked some sort of joy and also i cannot yet start this video without thanking the wonderful sponsor for today's video which is book of the month i always say this but if you're new and not familiar book of the month is a super popular and fast growing online book service for readers and their mission every month is to promote new and emerging authors and help readers find books that they genuinely love and they go through all of the research process themselves so that you can spend more time reading unless i'm researching which is really great because there's so many books coming out each and every single month but it's generally really hard to keep up and so their team take up the task every single month to vet through hundreds of books that they can bring you guys a curated selection of five new and early release titles and not only that but also which is one of the parts that i really love the most is that every single pick that they've had from previous months is still logged on their website so that you guys can get them as add-ons for a super cheap price because they really do have the best price for new hardcover fiction and it's super easy to customize because you can cancel any month at any time and you will not be charged and for their october choices we are starting off very on brand with october because it is a thriller and it is everything we didn't say rushed out of her hometown after high school a woman returns to solve the riddle of her family and the horrific crime as a historical fiction we have the lincoln highway and in this 1950 set novel shenanigans ensue when emmett watson hits the open road with two friends and a brother in tow a pic that i know a lot of people were anticipating and this is a book that i'll definitely be reading in november is the x hex which is a romance break ups the candy corn this quirky steamy rom-com about a major post-breakup hex will put a powerful spell on you for their literary fiction this month we have harlem shuffle which is a riveting and wily historical high story from a contemporary master that will leave you feeling in on the deal we also have a speculative fiction which is the perishing set in a hazy 1930s la this genre bending tale of a pioneering journalist explores shifts in time identity and love and remember those cool add-ons that i mentioned earlier they actually sent two my way and two books that i know a lot of people were anticipating too the new leanne moriarty book apple's never fall in the new alice huffman book and this is the book of magic and so if you do want to sign up for book of the month i will be leaving my link at the top of the description as always so that you can head over to their website and get your first book for 9.99 using my code mel reads as always again thank you so much to book of the month for sponsoring this wrap up and let's get right into the books that i read in the month of october i was really struggling with what to pick up first i felt at the time like i had built such an incredible tbr and i was just like what do i reach for first i ended up reading a dowry of blood first this was the first book that i picked up in september and it was the best choice i ended up reading this book 5 out of 5 stars i loved every single second of this it was lyrical it was magical it was whimsical it was flowery it was heartbreaking and it just had so many things going for it and i'm glad that it delivered on every single front that i was looking for in this one we have a reimagining of dracula's wives and we follow particularly constanta who meets befriends and ultimately falls in love with dracula himself and she basically recounts her entire vampire life with dracula and other partners and rights that he brings into the equation and all of the really cruel and terrible things that he's capable of that she genuinely didn't think he was gonna do and it is told through very short chapters like if you guys see this page it's like half empty and then you start another chapter and then it goes on for like two three pages and then another chapter starts so i think it was really great for my short attention span at the moment where i couldn't really focus on a big book or a complicated book and there is a polyamorous relationship in here there's a sapphic relationship in here it generally had so many layers and exquisite explorations of abuse and gaslighting and violence against women i wasn't expecting to experience in such a short book this book is truly to me a testament to how much an author can truly establish and convey and explore within a truly intentional set of words an amount of paper and it was unlike anything i had experienced before there's this quote in particular that just really really caught me and it goes like this you did not let me keep my name so i will strip you of yours in this world you are what i say you are and i say you are a ghost a long night's fever dream that i have finally woken up from i say you are the smoke wisp memory of a flame thawing eyes suffering under an early spring sun a chalk ledger of deaths being wiped clean i say you do not have a name i absolutely love this with every single bit of my heart i cannot even explain to you guys how good this book is so many things about dracula when i had read it were so interesting to me well with the subject of abuse and compassion towards this character that is not really good and exploring so many different facets of humanity and i was wondering as i was getting into this how much of that was going to be reflected and explored and i was not disappointed in any of that it just did such a great job at grabbing elements from the original work and turning it into its own thing and making it so freaking beautiful it's definitely a book that i'd say go ahead and read because it was literally exquisite a book that genuinely pained me because i wanted to like it so much more than i did i had so many great expectations i had heard so many amazing things and i was so sad that it truly didn't end up meeting those expectations for myself personally and that is where dreams descend you guys know this was the le fantasma pick for july july i feel like the months are blurring together for me but yes this was july right finished this in september because i still had a little bit of the audiobook left to go i say a little bit but it was probably either half or a little bit more than halfway and in this one we follow a magical circus called the conquering circus and we particularly follow these three characters that are some way somehow involved with this magic competition that is happening it is seemingly a really great opportunity for magicians all over the land but in reality there are a lot of hidden dark things happening behind the scenes and calia demarco and jack will soon find themselves in this really supposedly dark-esque journey to try and get out of these situations come out on top i was so disappointed with this book you guys i love both of the narrators one of the narrators is the narrator for strange the dreamer i think the beginning of this book was really really good the writing felt very whimsical and it felt like exactly what i was looking for with this particular story but i think between me not really being in the mood for y.a and then me also just expecting so much from this it ended up falling apart for me i found that the magic system was really really weak i found that within that magic system a lot of things were kind of mentioned a lot of subjects about patriarchy would also be frequently mentioned in the book but i felt like it didn't really go anywhere with the magic system i felt like we were just shown or told this magic system without any deeper explanation as to where it came from how it really works but rather this person can handle fire and then this person can create illusions and don't look at yourself in the mirror and just go along with it and i was really bothered by the fact that it seemed so shallow i was also really bothered by the main character kalia because everybody just seemingly knelt for her with no apparent reason it's like she is so great and so powerful and so unlike other girls because women are only meant for the kitchen that everybody ended up adoring her and idolizing her and putting her on a pedestal again without her even being that great of a character to begin with it tried to use this not like other girls trope with a really weak magic system while trying to address the patriarchy but not really establishing any really important conversations with it and then even down to the romance i genuinely did not see the development i didn't see the chemistry my saving grace for this was the writing in jack and next up another audio book that i read was the other black girl by sekia delilah harris and this is a book that to me is so interesting because while i loved the commentary and the jabs at the publishing industry there were elements about it that didn't really hash out and i think that's honestly most people's opinion about this book and also as i was reading reviews and talking to jaleesa and hearing to lisa's point because she read it right after i had read it it was definitely very eye-opening in so many different levels that i came to terms with the fact that yes while the commentary was great there were a lot of things that were questionable and that were kind of iffy about this book i will be leaving delisa's video linked down below for when she read this book in case you guys want to check it out and hear her thoughts on this particular story but what i really loved about this book was the commentary on the publishing industry so we follow nella who's our main character and she works at this publishing house as an assistant and she has admired previous work that black women have done with this publishing house and she aspires for more obviously she wants to get her own manuscript one day and just be more hands-on with this particular industry and at the start of the story she is also the only black girl working there up until we get our second esque main character hazel who becomes quote unquote as nella refers to her the other black girl and going into this i knew virtually nothing of the story i didn't know a synopsis i didn't know anything i was going in completely blind the audiobook was really good it was definitely one of those addicting audiobooks that you didn't want to stop listening to i think what was truly interesting to me was the whole commentary about the publishing industry and all of the hardships that nella as a character had to go through as a black woman in publishing and all of these different conversations about tokenism not being diversity and how white people constantly find themselves in these uncomfortable quote unquote situations where they don't want to talk about race and they don't want to talk about racism and they can't take constructive criticism when it comes to pocs being written by white folk and so all of this was addressed so well in my opinion in the book i think where the book truly falls apart is on that promise of get out because there was no sense of dread virtually in this book most of this book was a very passive storyline which i really didn't mind and i genuinely think that if this book would have been only a literary fiction i feel like i would have enjoyed this even more even with that devil worse prada element that is used as the pitch for this book even that i would have vibed with completely again if you take out that get out element because for there to be that sense of thriller there has to be a build up there has to be dread there has to be this feeling of impending doom that was never really present for the book the book also had these dual timelines that i constantly went back to and kept going wait where is this going how is this all gonna connect and i thought that those really took me out of the story but i was really just there for the commentary and i was really just there to read about nella and hazel's experience and to see where that kind of went and tied up i think if the book had a better undertone at letting people know that yes these things happen but there is light and love at the end of the tunnel maybe that would have been better i think it's anywhere between like a three and a four star for me but i genuinely do believe that the more i voice my thoughts on this book and the more i talk to people about this book i'm leaning more towards a three now and so there's nothing wrong with that there's nothing wrong with changing a rating but i think on hindsight even though i really loved the commentary there are a lot more things that i should have looked at at the moment another audiobook i think honestly september was really ruled by audiobooks for me which was really interesting but that was clara and the sun by kazuo ishiguro this book really made me want to read more casual ishiguro because i absolutely adored this book it ended up being a four star because i genuinely think that the commentary could have gone a little bit deeper it could have done more with the premise but i really do think it fulfilled so many different elements of the premise itself and things that i generally wasn't expecting and that were so shocking for me that i just really ended up falling in love with this writing style and i think because again this is such a passive storyline it's just like one linear timeline it was so much easier to consume on audio that i would really recommend that route if you guys are thinking of going into this book but the premise of this is super simple the synopsis we literally follow clara who is an ai she is an artificial intelligence and we basically follow the world through her eyes the way that clara looked at the world with this child-like innocence it was truly like seeing a child be born and discover the nuances of the world that we live in and it was told through such beautiful and introspective writing that it just makes you really think about the world that we live in and how as human beings we behave and interact with each other and the way that casual ishiguro talks about human emotion and human interaction it was so on point in a way that i had really not experienced before it was written with so much love and compassion and you can tell and clara as a main character was truly the best vessel for this story because oftentimes we see these sort of biased narrators that go into the story with this very specific sort of mindset and point of view whereas clara was really a blank slate she didn't know anything about the world and there were so many things that she didn't understand like why are these people hugging and crying at the same time or why is she yelling and right the next second she is smiling and laughing and running around like nothing has happened lara being that naive and being that immature and slowly maturing throughout the story with such a beautiful journey to go on i honestly just loved every second of this i think it was such an interesting story and honestly again unlike anything i'd ever read before really excited to explore more i really loved this i'm sure there's a million things i'm forgetting but all in all a really really solid four star book we've got one of my favorite new books and that is middle game by shannon mcguire middle game by seanan mcguire it is one of my favorite books now i absolutely adored this this was my second five star of the month along with a diary of blood shannon mcguire really did that and just delivered so beautifully i cannot say enough great things about this book this book explores the question the conversation of is godhood possible through which means and to what end it also contains the trope of a book within a book which is always really interesting and i think with this one it is one of the few books that i've read that includes this trope that actually had a purpose and that was actually intriguing we follow roger and dodger who are twins separated at birth twins that were born in very specific conditions because their maker reed who is an alchemist wants to achieve the doctrine of ethos and this is a doctrine that will allow him to achieve the impossible city and to finally completely walk down the improbable road which speaking that out loud it sounds extremely confusing but going into this book it is confusing these characters have absolutely no idea as to what's happening and we truly find out the information with them but what i really liked about this premise was that it was so ambitious it was so big and outlandish but so freaking cool if i had to explain how this book goes and it goes with this sort of conspiracy theory that i have heard go around is that when human beings are born they are born with the ability to be telepaths and they are born with telekinetic abilities etc whatever sort of mutant-esque ability that you guys can think of human beings are supposedly born with those but it's because they don't develop those as they grow older and because we only use such a small percentage of our brain that ability is lost so what if these babies were bred and born quite literally it sounds horrible but what if they were bread and born in these very specific conditions so that we can heighten those abilities and achieve godhood through that that is middle game that is the best way that i can explain this book and sean mcguire's writing was the perfect conduit for this story i was so concerned because these characters are supposed to be so smart roger is super good at linguistics and at literature and then his twin dodger is extremely gifted at mathematics and anything to do with numbers these are characters and even read their maker who's an alchemist these are people who are so smart and ambitious i was so worried the writing was not going to reflect that but it did i was in constant awe of the writing and of the journey and this is a storyline that is very repetitive because it is also a time traveling book but what she achieves through this sort of repetitive narrative is that sense of impending doom that sense of dread that the characters are experiencing by not getting things right time and time again that you as a reader are genuinely wondering all of the time are they gonna make it and it was so incredibly executed and again even though at first it seems like such a confusing story because there's so many terms scientific terms going around you're like is this gonna get simpler and it does you just have to trust the process trust her writing and hope that it gets better up until it does i generally adore this i do not think i didn't listen to the audiobook but this is definitely one of those books that i don't think i could do on audio i think i would get so confused with what's happening if i did maybe for some people it'll make it more digestible but the reading experience physical with some classical piano music on the background immaculate it was everything i definitely recommend and i can't wait for the second book to come out and see what goes on with that i think it's gonna be incredible another book i consumed on audio in the month of september was the witch's heart by genevieve gornicek this was the luffin tasman pick for september i was like what month are we in now it was for the month of september and i didn't love this i ended up reading this two stars just oh i also didn't say my rating for word dreams to send that was also a two star so that was my second two star of the month i really did not love the witch's heart we have again a very basic synopsis we follow anger bola who's a witch and whose heart she has lost and then she ends up meeting loki who coincidentally enough ends up finding her heart and today against all odds end up falling in love and forming a life together and we basically follow them through that journey and through anger bolda trying to remember who she truly is that was all the book was there was no sort of description or truly fantastic anything in this book if you are in any way shape or form familiar with norse mythology this is just coloring in some lines the way that i've explained this book to people and my thought process was if you went on to read a whack-back fanfiction of avengers or of the vampire diaries or of twilight where these young kids grab the script and they basically type everything out with no description and then they slap on their original character do a little few tweaks here and there and that's basically what they put out into the world i felt like that's what this book was the author grabbed norse mythology and then slapped it on the book added a little bit of some things here and there and then i don't even know where the story deviated from the original thing i genuinely don't think it did by a lot and everything just basically played out the same way that norse mythology did and it was honestly super disappointing a lot of the development between these two characters felt very nonsensical and very underdeveloped i know i previously said that it felt like fan fiction writing but i've read fan fiction better than this you guys like i've read so many great fan fictions that were by far better than this one also the fact that anger bola as a character like never truly recognized up until the very end that loki was emotionally exhausting and abusive and that he was constantly lying she was living under this cloud and under this false sense of love and security and she genuinely didn't realize which was so frustrating even scully was constantly telling her those things my saving grace for this book was literally scotty like scalia was my favorite character by far obviously the children were also some of my favorite parts of this book but it didn't really do anything completely 100 original in my opinion it's supposed to be a reimagining it's not supposed to be verbatim what happened if i wanted to read about norse mythology i'd go ahead and read a non-fiction not a loki fan fiction so to me it just ended up not being the book also in the month of september i ended up reading the final empire by brandon sanderson i will not be talking about this book in this wrap up because there is going to be a whole dedicated vlog to the mistborn trilogy so i'm not going to be talking about this book i am still slowly making my way through well of ascension and eventually through hero of ages so this will be left for that because i have so many thoughts that just need to be unpacked in that video not here so i don't want to spoil anything about that particular thing it was read in september the next book that i read in september was not a book that i was planning to read this month however the audiobook was readily available to borrow on libby so i decided to borrow it and read it again in my mornings or throughout any free spaces that i had because i really wanted another audiobook and so i ended up reading know my name by chanel miller and i really just need to preface this by this book was the easiest five stars that i've ever given in my entire life chanel miller's prose you guys it's some of the best that i have ever read it was so poetic at times and it was so heartbreaking yet inspirational and empowering and you could tell with how much love this book was written with and i will never forget listening to the author's note at the very end and just listening to her break down and cry it was such a fantastic book you guys and if you're ever thinking about reading this please do me a favor and read the audiobook because if there is any way to do that it is through that means because she narrates it herself and it just makes the experience so much more gut-wrenching and real that i feel like everybody needs to experience it in that way if possible and as a non-fiction memoir chanel finally tells her story no filters about her sexual assault rape case that happened in stanford a few years back where her identity was completely wiped from media and she was only called emily doe people did not acknowledge her name her heritage her race nothing about who she truly was was plastered on screen beyond the title of rape victim and i think as women and as human beings in general i'd hope and i know that's not the case in a lot of places or for a lot of people but as women we know how hard how strenuous how horrible it is to report a rape case because women are constantly plastered on the screen and they are villainized and it is never the assaulter's fault it is always the woman's fault oh she was provocative when she was wearing a skirt there is absolutely no excuse for a man or anybody to be carrying out any sort of sexual assault and she truly deconstructs this idea of rape victims of sexual assault victims of being pitched as the villain of the story whereas truly it's the men you should teach your kid to not be disrespectful towards women you should teach your kid that a woman under the influence is not an open invitation to grope her like an animal even if she doesn't verbally say no and it's truly such the humanizing process for women when they are establishing these cases and how long this process is too like the fact that this was initially supposed to be a three-month trial and then went on to a year and two years and every single aspect of her life had to be changed and accommodated to the single thing that still wasn't settled because the justice system didn't do anything to help and the fact that still people did not believe chanel the fact that they kept dehumanizing her stripping her of her name of her identity and continuously said that this man had potential and a place in society and that he was gonna go on to do great things and that was the sole basis of why all of his charges kept being reduced because he had potential the fact that that same courtesy was not extended to the victim herself you guys i have no words that this is still something that's happening and i have these two quotes that really just hit me hard there was a lot about this book that hit me hard but two in particular that i wrote down i am a victim i have no qualms with this word only with the idea that that is all that i am and then victims are often automatically accused of lying but when a predator is exposed of lying the stigma doesn't stick why is it that we're weary of victims making false accusations but rarely consider how many men have blatantly lied about downplayed or manipulated others to cover their own actions obviously there's a big trigger warning for the subject of rape and sexual assault but if you guys find yourselves within the power and strength to read this book i would absolutely recommend it because it is just a phenomenal read and last but not least i read the citadel booklet pick which is which is steeped in gold by cheyenne and smart this was another really disappointing book for me in the month of september again i was really not in the mood to read why a having just finished mistborn and then going into which is stepped in gold it was definitely not the best book to transition into why a again and also because the magic systems of both of these books at the core were so similar i found myself often even though i hated doing it my brain kept drawing these comparisons at the level of development that i just couldn't look past the fact that this book ended up being extremely confusing now in this one we basically have a story of revenge we have arreya who has spent most of her life in a cell who is a warrior and then we have jasmine who is the doyen's daughter and the doyen is this empress queen-like figure for society in this world and so jasmine is technically the heir of the throne and both of these characters have very different motivations as to why they want to kill the doyen and they essentially go on this path of revenge together against all odds and against every belief and this book again really ended up being very confusing for me the magic system was very shallow for me as well the core of the magic system relied a lot on metals similarly to again mistborn which i had previously read and i found that a lot of it truly boiled down to a conviction and through the medals you can hone some sort of magic and expel it out to the world and it really lacked development for me i also found that the character's voices were very easy to confuse i did read this on audio i'll preface by saying that the only way i could differentiate whose pov it was was through the side characters it was not even through the main characters themselves their voices sounded very very similar throughout the entirety of the story the pacing was also really really damaging to this particular narrative the pacing was all over the place it started out really nice and then the middle was extremely draggy with very little exciting moments and then it all tied up at the end but i basically felt like i read a setup novel and i didn't really read something that had a lot of exciting elements to it and that constantly kept me engaged i had to snap myself constantly back into again the story because my brain just didn't want to grasp onto anything really so it was super sad that that was my experience because you guys know this was one of my most anticipated releases for 2021 the romance in here also zero connection it made no sense to me and i hate when again romance is at the forefront of the story in order to create some sort of conflict for characters and in order to hide some sort of shallow character development world building and i found that this book a lot of the time did that it was like you need to stay away from this boy because this boy is really not good for you and i just really didn't love that so again to me it ended up being really disappointing and i ended up giving this two stars and i really wished because i knew that people weren't loving it i had really big hopes that i would be on the opposite end of things and i sadly was not and so those were the books that i ended up reading in the month of september i hope that you guys enjoyed this video if you did don't forget to smash that like button down below and also as always let me know down in the comments what you guys ended up reading for the month of september did you guys find any five stars did you guys find any particularly good books favorites anything disappointing let me know all of that down in the comments and if you've read any of the books that i read in september also let me know i'd love to chat with you guys down in the comments if you reached the end of the video let's leave some flame emojis down below in honor of mr metal game so let's leave some flame emojis down below if you've made it to the very end don't forget to subscribe down below if you haven't already i am constantly uploading videos i'm sure you won't want to miss and if you guys want to support the channel further i do have a patreon we are called the citadel and that is always linked down below alongside all of my social medias again thank you so much to book of the month for sponsoring today's video don't forget that you guys can check them out over at the link in my description and use my code mel reads to get your first book for 9.99 i love you guys so much and i shall see you on the next one bye guys youwhere did september go it feels like i filmed last year's september wrap-up yesterday but september was exactly what i needed it was a super refreshing month and i'm really excited to talk about everything that i read so let's get into it hello book reading friends welcome back to my channel or welcome if you're new my name is mel and today i bring you guys all the books i read in the month of september also known as my september wrap up it is honestly so wild to think about the fact that even though i already filmed my october tbr and this has already kind of sunk in that september's over september was a really great month in terms of balance and the books that i got to read i was also trying to get out of like a three week reading slump that i was just not in the mood to read and i was having the best time not reading but i was really struggling because i was like oh this book sounds so good let's read it and then i opened it and i couldn't get myself to read it and i couldn't push through and my main thing with september was i don't want to be reading 20 books a month anymore 20 books a month is like so outlandish i don't know if i could do it again at least not anytime soon and so i really reduced the amount of books that i was reading i was a lot more mindful with my reading and i was rather reading the books that i really really wanted to reach for and not things to kind of fill in of like oh my god i haven't really read that much let me squeeze in a comic or let me squeeze in a graphic novel or a volume or a short book or this or that i was really not in that mindset and it was so nice to not feel any sort of pressure mostly put in by myself to read anything and to really just reach for the things that genuinely sparked some sort of joy and also i cannot yet start this video without thanking the wonderful sponsor for today's video which is book of the month i always say this but if you're new and not familiar book of the month is a super popular and fast growing online book service for readers and their mission every month is to promote new and emerging authors and help readers find books that they genuinely love and they go through all of the research process themselves so that you can spend more time reading unless i'm researching which is really great because there's so many books coming out each and every single month but it's generally really hard to keep up and so their team take up the task every single month to vet through hundreds of books that they can bring you guys a curated selection of five new and early release titles and not only that but also which is one of the parts that i really love the most is that every single pick that they've had from previous months is still logged on their website so that you guys can get them as add-ons for a super cheap price because they really do have the best price for new hardcover fiction and it's super easy to customize because you can cancel any month at any time and you will not be charged and for their october choices we are starting off very on brand with october because it is a thriller and it is everything we didn't say rushed out of her hometown after high school a woman returns to solve the riddle of her family and the horrific crime as a historical fiction we have the lincoln highway and in this 1950 set novel shenanigans ensue when emmett watson hits the open road with two friends and a brother in tow a pic that i know a lot of people were anticipating and this is a book that i'll definitely be reading in november is the x hex which is a romance break ups the candy corn this quirky steamy rom-com about a major post-breakup hex will put a powerful spell on you for their literary fiction this month we have harlem shuffle which is a riveting and wily historical high story from a contemporary master that will leave you feeling in on the deal we also have a speculative fiction which is the perishing set in a hazy 1930s la this genre bending tale of a pioneering journalist explores shifts in time identity and love and remember those cool add-ons that i mentioned earlier they actually sent two my way and two books that i know a lot of people were anticipating too the new leanne moriarty book apple's never fall in the new alice huffman book and this is the book of magic and so if you do want to sign up for book of the month i will be leaving my link at the top of the description as always so that you can head over to their website and get your first book for 9.99 using my code mel reads as always again thank you so much to book of the month for sponsoring this wrap up and let's get right into the books that i read in the month of october i was really struggling with what to pick up first i felt at the time like i had built such an incredible tbr and i was just like what do i reach for first i ended up reading a dowry of blood first this was the first book that i picked up in september and it was the best choice i ended up reading this book 5 out of 5 stars i loved every single second of this it was lyrical it was magical it was whimsical it was flowery it was heartbreaking and it just had so many things going for it and i'm glad that it delivered on every single front that i was looking for in this one we have a reimagining of dracula's wives and we follow particularly constanta who meets befriends and ultimately falls in love with dracula himself and she basically recounts her entire vampire life with dracula and other partners and rights that he brings into the equation and all of the really cruel and terrible things that he's capable of that she genuinely didn't think he was gonna do and it is told through very short chapters like if you guys see this page it's like half empty and then you start another chapter and then it goes on for like two three pages and then another chapter starts so i think it was really great for my short attention span at the moment where i couldn't really focus on a big book or a complicated book and there is a polyamorous relationship in here there's a sapphic relationship in here it generally had so many layers and exquisite explorations of abuse and gaslighting and violence against women i wasn't expecting to experience in such a short book this book is truly to me a testament to how much an author can truly establish and convey and explore within a truly intentional set of words an amount of paper and it was unlike anything i had experienced before there's this quote in particular that just really really caught me and it goes like this you did not let me keep my name so i will strip you of yours in this world you are what i say you are and i say you are a ghost a long night's fever dream that i have finally woken up from i say you are the smoke wisp memory of a flame thawing eyes suffering under an early spring sun a chalk ledger of deaths being wiped clean i say you do not have a name i absolutely love this with every single bit of my heart i cannot even explain to you guys how good this book is so many things about dracula when i had read it were so interesting to me well with the subject of abuse and compassion towards this character that is not really good and exploring so many different facets of humanity and i was wondering as i was getting into this how much of that was going to be reflected and explored and i was not disappointed in any of that it just did such a great job at grabbing elements from the original work and turning it into its own thing and making it so freaking beautiful it's definitely a book that i'd say go ahead and read because it was literally exquisite a book that genuinely pained me because i wanted to like it so much more than i did i had so many great expectations i had heard so many amazing things and i was so sad that it truly didn't end up meeting those expectations for myself personally and that is where dreams descend you guys know this was the le fantasma pick for july july i feel like the months are blurring together for me but yes this was july right finished this in september because i still had a little bit of the audiobook left to go i say a little bit but it was probably either half or a little bit more than halfway and in this one we follow a magical circus called the conquering circus and we particularly follow these three characters that are some way somehow involved with this magic competition that is happening it is seemingly a really great opportunity for magicians all over the land but in reality there are a lot of hidden dark things happening behind the scenes and calia demarco and jack will soon find themselves in this really supposedly dark-esque journey to try and get out of these situations come out on top i was so disappointed with this book you guys i love both of the narrators one of the narrators is the narrator for strange the dreamer i think the beginning of this book was really really good the writing felt very whimsical and it felt like exactly what i was looking for with this particular story but i think between me not really being in the mood for y.a and then me also just expecting so much from this it ended up falling apart for me i found that the magic system was really really weak i found that within that magic system a lot of things were kind of mentioned a lot of subjects about patriarchy would also be frequently mentioned in the book but i felt like it didn't really go anywhere with the magic system i felt like we were just shown or told this magic system without any deeper explanation as to where it came from how it really works but rather this person can handle fire and then this person can create illusions and don't look at yourself in the mirror and just go along with it and i was really bothered by the fact that it seemed so shallow i was also really bothered by the main character kalia because everybody just seemingly knelt for her with no apparent reason it's like she is so great and so powerful and so unlike other girls because women are only meant for the kitchen that everybody ended up adoring her and idolizing her and putting her on a pedestal again without her even being that great of a character to begin with it tried to use this not like other girls trope with a really weak magic system while trying to address the patriarchy but not really establishing any really important conversations with it and then even down to the romance i genuinely did not see the development i didn't see the chemistry my saving grace for this was the writing in jack and next up another audio book that i read was the other black girl by sekia delilah harris and this is a book that to me is so interesting because while i loved the commentary and the jabs at the publishing industry there were elements about it that didn't really hash out and i think that's honestly most people's opinion about this book and also as i was reading reviews and talking to jaleesa and hearing to lisa's point because she read it right after i had read it it was definitely very eye-opening in so many different levels that i came to terms with the fact that yes while the commentary was great there were a lot of things that were questionable and that were kind of iffy about this book i will be leaving delisa's video linked down below for when she read this book in case you guys want to check it out and hear her thoughts on this particular story but what i really loved about this book was the commentary on the publishing industry so we follow nella who's our main character and she works at this publishing house as an assistant and she has admired previous work that black women have done with this publishing house and she aspires for more obviously she wants to get her own manuscript one day and just be more hands-on with this particular industry and at the start of the story she is also the only black girl working there up until we get our second esque main character hazel who becomes quote unquote as nella refers to her the other black girl and going into this i knew virtually nothing of the story i didn't know a synopsis i didn't know anything i was going in completely blind the audiobook was really good it was definitely one of those addicting audiobooks that you didn't want to stop listening to i think what was truly interesting to me was the whole commentary about the publishing industry and all of the hardships that nella as a character had to go through as a black woman in publishing and all of these different conversations about tokenism not being diversity and how white people constantly find themselves in these uncomfortable quote unquote situations where they don't want to talk about race and they don't want to talk about racism and they can't take constructive criticism when it comes to pocs being written by white folk and so all of this was addressed so well in my opinion in the book i think where the book truly falls apart is on that promise of get out because there was no sense of dread virtually in this book most of this book was a very passive storyline which i really didn't mind and i genuinely think that if this book would have been only a literary fiction i feel like i would have enjoyed this even more even with that devil worse prada element that is used as the pitch for this book even that i would have vibed with completely again if you take out that get out element because for there to be that sense of thriller there has to be a build up there has to be dread there has to be this feeling of impending doom that was never really present for the book the book also had these dual timelines that i constantly went back to and kept going wait where is this going how is this all gonna connect and i thought that those really took me out of the story but i was really just there for the commentary and i was really just there to read about nella and hazel's experience and to see where that kind of went and tied up i think if the book had a better undertone at letting people know that yes these things happen but there is light and love at the end of the tunnel maybe that would have been better i think it's anywhere between like a three and a four star for me but i genuinely do believe that the more i voice my thoughts on this book and the more i talk to people about this book i'm leaning more towards a three now and so there's nothing wrong with that there's nothing wrong with changing a rating but i think on hindsight even though i really loved the commentary there are a lot more things that i should have looked at at the moment another audiobook i think honestly september was really ruled by audiobooks for me which was really interesting but that was clara and the sun by kazuo ishiguro this book really made me want to read more casual ishiguro because i absolutely adored this book it ended up being a four star because i genuinely think that the commentary could have gone a little bit deeper it could have done more with the premise but i really do think it fulfilled so many different elements of the premise itself and things that i generally wasn't expecting and that were so shocking for me that i just really ended up falling in love with this writing style and i think because again this is such a passive storyline it's just like one linear timeline it was so much easier to consume on audio that i would really recommend that route if you guys are thinking of going into this book but the premise of this is super simple the synopsis we literally follow clara who is an ai she is an artificial intelligence and we basically follow the world through her eyes the way that clara looked at the world with this child-like innocence it was truly like seeing a child be born and discover the nuances of the world that we live in and it was told through such beautiful and introspective writing that it just makes you really think about the world that we live in and how as human beings we behave and interact with each other and the way that casual ishiguro talks about human emotion and human interaction it was so on point in a way that i had really not experienced before it was written with so much love and compassion and you can tell and clara as a main character was truly the best vessel for this story because oftentimes we see these sort of biased narrators that go into the story with this very specific sort of mindset and point of view whereas clara was really a blank slate she didn't know anything about the world and there were so many things that she didn't understand like why are these people hugging and crying at the same time or why is she yelling and right the next second she is smiling and laughing and running around like nothing has happened lara being that naive and being that immature and slowly maturing throughout the story with such a beautiful journey to go on i honestly just loved every second of this i think it was such an interesting story and honestly again unlike anything i'd ever read before really excited to explore more i really loved this i'm sure there's a million things i'm forgetting but all in all a really really solid four star book we've got one of my favorite new books and that is middle game by shannon mcguire middle game by seanan mcguire it is one of my favorite books now i absolutely adored this this was my second five star of the month along with a diary of blood shannon mcguire really did that and just delivered so beautifully i cannot say enough great things about this book this book explores the question the conversation of is godhood possible through which means and to what end it also contains the trope of a book within a book which is always really interesting and i think with this one it is one of the few books that i've read that includes this trope that actually had a purpose and that was actually intriguing we follow roger and dodger who are twins separated at birth twins that were born in very specific conditions because their maker reed who is an alchemist wants to achieve the doctrine of ethos and this is a doctrine that will allow him to achieve the impossible city and to finally completely walk down the improbable road which speaking that out loud it sounds extremely confusing but going into this book it is confusing these characters have absolutely no idea as to what's happening and we truly find out the information with them but what i really liked about this premise was that it was so ambitious it was so big and outlandish but so freaking cool if i had to explain how this book goes and it goes with this sort of conspiracy theory that i have heard go around is that when human beings are born they are born with the ability to be telepaths and they are born with telekinetic abilities etc whatever sort of mutant-esque ability that you guys can think of human beings are supposedly born with those but it's because they don't develop those as they grow older and because we only use such a small percentage of our brain that ability is lost so what if these babies were bred and born quite literally it sounds horrible but what if they were bread and born in these very specific conditions so that we can heighten those abilities and achieve godhood through that that is middle game that is the best way that i can explain this book and sean mcguire's writing was the perfect conduit for this story i was so concerned because these characters are supposed to be so smart roger is super good at linguistics and at literature and then his twin dodger is extremely gifted at mathematics and anything to do with numbers these are characters and even read their maker who's an alchemist these are people who are so smart and ambitious i was so worried the writing was not going to reflect that but it did i was in constant awe of the writing and of the journey and this is a storyline that is very repetitive because it is also a time traveling book but what she achieves through this sort of repetitive narrative is that sense of impending doom that sense of dread that the characters are experiencing by not getting things right time and time again that you as a reader are genuinely wondering all of the time are they gonna make it and it was so incredibly executed and again even though at first it seems like such a confusing story because there's so many terms scientific terms going around you're like is this gonna get simpler and it does you just have to trust the process trust her writing and hope that it gets better up until it does i generally adore this i do not think i didn't listen to the audiobook but this is definitely one of those books that i don't think i could do on audio i think i would get so confused with what's happening if i did maybe for some people it'll make it more digestible but the reading experience physical with some classical piano music on the background immaculate it was everything i definitely recommend and i can't wait for the second book to come out and see what goes on with that i think it's gonna be incredible another book i consumed on audio in the month of september was the witch's heart by genevieve gornicek this was the luffin tasman pick for september i was like what month are we in now it was for the month of september and i didn't love this i ended up reading this two stars just oh i also didn't say my rating for word dreams to send that was also a two star so that was my second two star of the month i really did not love the witch's heart we have again a very basic synopsis we follow anger bola who's a witch and whose heart she has lost and then she ends up meeting loki who coincidentally enough ends up finding her heart and today against all odds end up falling in love and forming a life together and we basically follow them through that journey and through anger bolda trying to remember who she truly is that was all the book was there was no sort of description or truly fantastic anything in this book if you are in any way shape or form familiar with norse mythology this is just coloring in some lines the way that i've explained this book to people and my thought process was if you went on to read a whack-back fanfiction of avengers or of the vampire diaries or of twilight where these young kids grab the script and they basically type everything out with no description and then they slap on their original character do a little few tweaks here and there and that's basically what they put out into the world i felt like that's what this book was the author grabbed norse mythology and then slapped it on the book added a little bit of some things here and there and then i don't even know where the story deviated from the original thing i genuinely don't think it did by a lot and everything just basically played out the same way that norse mythology did and it was honestly super disappointing a lot of the development between these two characters felt very nonsensical and very underdeveloped i know i previously said that it felt like fan fiction writing but i've read fan fiction better than this you guys like i've read so many great fan fictions that were by far better than this one also the fact that anger bola as a character like never truly recognized up until the very end that loki was emotionally exhausting and abusive and that he was constantly lying she was living under this cloud and under this false sense of love and security and she genuinely didn't realize which was so frustrating even scully was constantly telling her those things my saving grace for this book was literally scotty like scalia was my favorite character by far obviously the children were also some of my favorite parts of this book but it didn't really do anything completely 100 original in my opinion it's supposed to be a reimagining it's not supposed to be verbatim what happened if i wanted to read about norse mythology i'd go ahead and read a non-fiction not a loki fan fiction so to me it just ended up not being the book also in the month of september i ended up reading the final empire by brandon sanderson i will not be talking about this book in this wrap up because there is going to be a whole dedicated vlog to the mistborn trilogy so i'm not going to be talking about this book i am still slowly making my way through well of ascension and eventually through hero of ages so this will be left for that because i have so many thoughts that just need to be unpacked in that video not here so i don't want to spoil anything about that particular thing it was read in september the next book that i read in september was not a book that i was planning to read this month however the audiobook was readily available to borrow on libby so i decided to borrow it and read it again in my mornings or throughout any free spaces that i had because i really wanted another audiobook and so i ended up reading know my name by chanel miller and i really just need to preface this by this book was the easiest five stars that i've ever given in my entire life chanel miller's prose you guys it's some of the best that i have ever read it was so poetic at times and it was so heartbreaking yet inspirational and empowering and you could tell with how much love this book was written with and i will never forget listening to the author's note at the very end and just listening to her break down and cry it was such a fantastic book you guys and if you're ever thinking about reading this please do me a favor and read the audiobook because if there is any way to do that it is through that means because she narrates it herself and it just makes the experience so much more gut-wrenching and real that i feel like everybody needs to experience it in that way if possible and as a non-fiction memoir chanel finally tells her story no filters about her sexual assault rape case that happened in stanford a few years back where her identity was completely wiped from media and she was only called emily doe people did not acknowledge her name her heritage her race nothing about who she truly was was plastered on screen beyond the title of rape victim and i think as women and as human beings in general i'd hope and i know that's not the case in a lot of places or for a lot of people but as women we know how hard how strenuous how horrible it is to report a rape case because women are constantly plastered on the screen and they are villainized and it is never the assaulter's fault it is always the woman's fault oh she was provocative when she was wearing a skirt there is absolutely no excuse for a man or anybody to be carrying out any sort of sexual assault and she truly deconstructs this idea of rape victims of sexual assault victims of being pitched as the villain of the story whereas truly it's the men you should teach your kid to not be disrespectful towards women you should teach your kid that a woman under the influence is not an open invitation to grope her like an animal even if she doesn't verbally say no and it's truly such the humanizing process for women when they are establishing these cases and how long this process is too like the fact that this was initially supposed to be a three-month trial and then went on to a year and two years and every single aspect of her life had to be changed and accommodated to the single thing that still wasn't settled because the justice system didn't do anything to help and the fact that still people did not believe chanel the fact that they kept dehumanizing her stripping her of her name of her identity and continuously said that this man had potential and a place in society and that he was gonna go on to do great things and that was the sole basis of why all of his charges kept being reduced because he had potential the fact that that same courtesy was not extended to the victim herself you guys i have no words that this is still something that's happening and i have these two quotes that really just hit me hard there was a lot about this book that hit me hard but two in particular that i wrote down i am a victim i have no qualms with this word only with the idea that that is all that i am and then victims are often automatically accused of lying but when a predator is exposed of lying the stigma doesn't stick why is it that we're weary of victims making false accusations but rarely consider how many men have blatantly lied about downplayed or manipulated others to cover their own actions obviously there's a big trigger warning for the subject of rape and sexual assault but if you guys find yourselves within the power and strength to read this book i would absolutely recommend it because it is just a phenomenal read and last but not least i read the citadel booklet pick which is which is steeped in gold by cheyenne and smart this was another really disappointing book for me in the month of september again i was really not in the mood to read why a having just finished mistborn and then going into which is stepped in gold it was definitely not the best book to transition into why a again and also because the magic systems of both of these books at the core were so similar i found myself often even though i hated doing it my brain kept drawing these comparisons at the level of development that i just couldn't look past the fact that this book ended up being extremely confusing now in this one we basically have a story of revenge we have arreya who has spent most of her life in a cell who is a warrior and then we have jasmine who is the doyen's daughter and the doyen is this empress queen-like figure for society in this world and so jasmine is technically the heir of the throne and both of these characters have very different motivations as to why they want to kill the doyen and they essentially go on this path of revenge together against all odds and against every belief and this book again really ended up being very confusing for me the magic system was very shallow for me as well the core of the magic system relied a lot on metals similarly to again mistborn which i had previously read and i found that a lot of it truly boiled down to a conviction and through the medals you can hone some sort of magic and expel it out to the world and it really lacked development for me i also found that the character's voices were very easy to confuse i did read this on audio i'll preface by saying that the only way i could differentiate whose pov it was was through the side characters it was not even through the main characters themselves their voices sounded very very similar throughout the entirety of the story the pacing was also really really damaging to this particular narrative the pacing was all over the place it started out really nice and then the middle was extremely draggy with very little exciting moments and then it all tied up at the end but i basically felt like i read a setup novel and i didn't really read something that had a lot of exciting elements to it and that constantly kept me engaged i had to snap myself constantly back into again the story because my brain just didn't want to grasp onto anything really so it was super sad that that was my experience because you guys know this was one of my most anticipated releases for 2021 the romance in here also zero connection it made no sense to me and i hate when again romance is at the forefront of the story in order to create some sort of conflict for characters and in order to hide some sort of shallow character development world building and i found that this book a lot of the time did that it was like you need to stay away from this boy because this boy is really not good for you and i just really didn't love that so again to me it ended up being really disappointing and i ended up giving this two stars and i really wished because i knew that people weren't loving it i had really big hopes that i would be on the opposite end of things and i sadly was not and so those were the books that i ended up reading in the month of september i hope that you guys enjoyed this video if you did don't forget to smash that like button down below and also as always let me know down in the comments what you guys ended up reading for the month of september did you guys find any five stars did you guys find any particularly good books favorites anything disappointing let me know all of that down in the comments and if you've read any of the books that i read in september also let me know i'd love to chat with you guys down in the comments if you reached the end of the video let's leave some flame emojis down below in honor of mr metal game so let's leave some flame emojis down below if you've made it to the very end don't forget to subscribe down below if you haven't already i am constantly uploading videos i'm sure you won't want to miss and if you guys want to support the channel further i do have a patreon we are called the citadel and that is always linked down below alongside all of my social medias again thank you so much to book of the month for sponsoring today's video don't forget that you guys can check them out over at the link in my description and use my code mel reads to get your first book for 9.99 i love you guys so much and i shall see you on the next one bye guys you\n"