the last book haul of 2021: books i've never heard of, romance & literary fiction

you're done you're done you're done it's like an oscar wild dress uh [Music] hey what's up how are you doing my name is emma and it's so nice to have you here today i'm very sad because i don't have any milk for my coffee but we're gonna film a book haul we've got hot coffee balancing on blankets we've got a candle balancing on a stack of books what could go wrong i'm just gonna get right into this book haul it's just a big wonderful medley of books i've recently acquired a lot of them are gifts i have a little bookstore haul in here too that i'm gonna i think i'm gonna start with at first so yeah snuggle up get cozy maybe find some inspiration and keep an eye on this mug of coffee for me please okay thank you can you even see this i don't think you can there you go you can keep an eye on it for me so i don't spill it everywhere the first book i'm actually reading i'm still using my receipt as my bookmark so this is neon gods by katie roberts 2021 has been the year where i've slowly discovered that i like romance books like specific romance books and just it's been the year of getting back into the genre or just getting into the genre in general because i've never read romance and i'm loving my journey i'm really loving it so this one i actually heard about on book talk but i had heard of katie roberts previously because she's written a number of books but neon gods is an unspeakably hot you can't speak about the hotness it's too hot to be spoken about retelling of greek mythology principally i think focusing on hades and persephone because i'm about like 40 pages in really liking it um but it does also include all of the other gods in the pantheon because this is set in basically like an urban city where it's divided into the upper city it's called and the lower city and the upper city is like presided over by the 13 but in reality 12 because hades was exiled to the lower city no one has heard of him but essentially they are humans who take on like the role of for example zeus or demeter or hermes dionysus and stuff like that and so they ruled this city persephone is of course the daughter of demeter and right when this book begins her mother without her permission basically forces her into an engagement with zeus and zeus is just like this awful evil corrupt dude who we all know him to be um but essentially it's rumored that he has killed his previous three wives and persephone is now slated to be his next wife and she's like hell no i'm out of here and so she runs across the border into the lower city which no one is supposed to basically cut across to since it is forbidden we have a nice little map and who does she meet when she crosses the bridge hades himself who it's rumored that you know he's not supposed to exist no one knows of his um whereabouts and no one knows really what he's doing down there but i guess she's gonna find out i'm so looking forward to this like i said i just started reading it because i was just super duper in the mood for something like this and i'm so excited i read a touch of darkness by scarlet saint claire earlier this year which was another hades and persephone retelling kind of enjoyed it but i think i'm getting the vibes already that i'm gonna enjoy this one so much more so i am i'm really really excited for this one so that is neon neon gods this one i'm going to really briefly mention as well because i also got this when i went to the bookstore of my friend um you guys have already heard me talking about this and that is for the wolf by hannah witton i did actually finish this a couple of days ago so it's very very loosely a little red riding hood retelling basically not at all um but this is about two sisters red and neve and in this world there's a prophecy that when a second daughter is born to the kingdom of valid and the second daughter is always destined to be for the wolf in that she is sent out into the wilder wood which is this magical forest that essentially is keeping all the bad bad stuff um monsters and demons and stuff like that that was terrorizing the kingdom and the countryside and the forest has locked it all inside because the forest is actually full of magic and power and like a life all of its own which is super spooky that was my favorite thing about this book when red arrives in the forest she finds out that the wolf is actually just a man named eamonn and the story unfolds from there so i really like this i gave this almost a four star almost almost a four star i was enamored with the beginning i really appreciated and loved and was spooked by the end the middle of this book um just i think needed a lot more editing and needed some more thought just needed some more focus in my opinion but um i will definitely be continuing on with this series so that's really fun and i'm so glad i bought this so that is for the wolf it was perfect for december or just the spooky wintry months as well so that is that one this next one is also perfect for winter because the next one i picked up at the bookstore was midnight in everwood by m.a kozniar i'd never heard of this before until i just saw it on the shelf and this cover absolutely just called my name and it was like emma emma buy me so i bought it um and when i picked up and read the synopsis i was like you're coming home with me i love the nutcracker i'm actually in the middle of another nutcracker retelling right now called the enchanted sonata but this one is also one and we're following this woman named marietta and she wants to be a ballerina but her ballet days are slowly coming to an end i believe her parents are trying to marry her off this is set in 1906 and so when a mysterious man dr drosselmeyer moves in next door and promises her that she'll be able to extend her dancing days she of course agrees to the strange deal or bargain that he struck up with her but then she finds out that she might be trapped i think in everwood because he has some magic of his own and yeah really excited about this one really really excited i'm gonna try to get to it this year um in december and if i can't then i will save it for next year but um this is just absolutely gorgeous look it oh and then finally the last of the books that i picked up from the bookstore is a wolf first fell um by kara sutton no wait okay i got excited that this was a different author than it was um oh and i actually i just opened it i did not know there are illustrations in this one that is so fun oh i didn't know it came with these so this one i have had first of all look at this cover again i swear like winter books or like wintery magical books just have the absolutely most beautiful covers i've had my eye on this book actually for a while because i heard jade from jd rereads talk about it and she gives the best winter polar fantasy recommendations ever so highly recommend checking her out but she talked about this a long time ago and i've just been thinking about it ever since and then when i saw it on the shelf in the middle grade section since this is a middle grade book at the bookstore i was like you know what it's time it's time you're coming home with me um and it's just an absolutely beautiful book look at this it has a little wolf face oh it's so pretty a wolf for a spell is based on a lot of i believe russian folklore and stories and myths since she was a pup zema has been taught to fear humans especially witches but when her family is threatened she has no choice but to seek help from the witch baba yaga so this wolf goes out to seek baba yaga but actually what ends up happening is that the wolf gets put into baba yoga's body and then like left there and now this wolf is just a human or whatever the baba yogg is but then this other girl this human girl is also seeking to repair or to protect her village or something like that her name is nadia and when she goes in search of the witch who does she find but the wolf who is actually in baba yaga's body and they find out that they have a common enemy they team up um and i'm so excited i love books that feature wolves and stuff like that and this ah it's just gonna be so sweet i think i've heard really really good things about this so those are the books that i picked up for myself um a while ago now that bookstore ship was a while ago and the rest of the ones that you see behind me are literally from all of you guys thank you so much what the heck what the heck okay so let's start with this one this one came a long time ago and this is from jenna thank you so much this looks absolutely ah looks amazing this is the membranes by chita wei and this is translated by arie larissa heinrich i love the cover very simplistic chitaway is an author from taiwan and this is a piece of taiwanese science fiction in the late 21st century humanity has migrated to domes at the bottom of the sea because climate change has just completely ravaged the surface of the earth and so we've all escaped into the ocean kind of gives me um that planet no that that jar jar binks place off of naboo what's it called what is his kingdom called following momo in the membranes who is the most celebrated dermal care technician in all of t city but after meeting her estranged mother she begins to explore her true identity a journey that leads to questioning the bounds of gender memory self and reality i'm really wondering because i don't think this is a science fiction book that primarily focuses on like or maybe it does the future and like obviously living underwater and stuff like that but what it seems to be is actually more of like an introspective character study because it says that this is a classic of queer speculative fiction i'm really excited to see like how the science fiction weaves into the self-discovery aspect so that is the membranes this one came a couple of days ago and i already started reading it because i got really excited i've been hearing everyone and their mother and father and grandson and granddaughter and pet canary talk about this book and that is a dowry of blood by st gibson um love this cover like i said i started reading it the writing is gorgeous the writing does not disappoint i like picked this up and i did not want to put it down i'm like in the mood to read everything and anything right now this is from morgan thank you so much this is a reimagining of dracula's brides it's also a book about relationships but specifically i believe abusive relationships because we follow the relation between constanta who is a woman who is dying dracula finds her um and essentially turns her into a vampire and then takes her as one of his brides but it's also about constanta and like her friendship with the other brides that dracula has i believe and like coming to terms with their relationship and eventually like from page one she tells us that she murders dracula or murders the count so yeah finding comfort in the arms of her rival consort she begins to unravel their husband's dark secrets i don't think i need to say anymore this has been so great i literally got 11 pages in and i fell in love so that is diary of blood a dowry of blood this next one was also a gift thank you so much this one's actually funny because i first heard about this book i first heard about this book actually from my high school geography teacher and i've had it in the back of my mind like ever since because she was just raving about how good it was um and then this showed up in my p.o box and that is the red tent by anita diamond diamonds i want to say dml oh i didn't know it got turned into a mini-series either but this focuses on one woman i believe from the bible right dina and in the bible her life is only hinted at in a brief and violent detour within the more familiar chapters about her father jacob not only goes over dina's story but i think it backtracks to her mother's or her grandmother's and then maybe proceeds her as well my geography teacher just spoke so highly of this and there's a really loving note that came with this that also said this was amazing so that is the red tent then we have a beautiful copy of schindler's list by thomas keanely um we're just going back to high school in my high school history class we watched um the movie with liam neeson except it was the french dub i believe um but i've never read the book i actually don't think i really knew it was a book i thought it was just a movie um but now i know so thank you so so much if you've never heard of this or seen the movie i think it's a i think it's a pretty well known um stuff like there's also one the booker prize which is cool but and it's based on a true story extraordinary novel tells how german wore profiteer and factory director oscar schindler came to save more jews from the gas chambers than any other single person during world war ii then we have the shipping news by e annie poole pruel our main character in this one is a 36 year old man who is a newspaper man he delivers newspapers right um but he finds out that his wife is cheating on him and so he's like you know what that's it kids we're moving to newfoundland so this book i believe actually principally takes place mostly in newfoundland and it follows two or three generations of his family after that um but living on newfoundland like he starts to confront um his past demons what's been going on with him but of course also having to come to terms with the nature um and the force of nature that is around them living on newfoundland it says he begins to see the possibility of love without pain or misery um it's a darkly comic magical portrait of the contemporary american family people have actually recommended this to me before so um it's really funny that it just showed up but thank you so much i'm like randomly compiling so many books that are now set on newfoundland because this is like the third one that i can think of off the top of my head that's on my shelf um so i'm really excited and i would love to visit there i might be visiting newfoundland next year we'll see anyway that is the shipping news okay we all know it would oh we all know it would not be an emma book haul if we did not have a rolca section and we have a big brilliant section this time so i'm just gonna really really briefly ah no don't put the coffee in the book we're just gonna really briefly mention these because i'm so uh just so happy to have mariloka in my life and i would love to complete some more of his works in 2022. um but the first one is early poems um and this was actually made custom made by one of you guys this is from olga so thank you so much it is absolutely beautiful absolutely beautiful so i'm so happy to have this and then we also have duino allergies this is a really cute small little coffee um with the german on one side and the english on the other you could literally well i can't fit this in my pockets because i am a woman but for the men out there i bet you could put this in your pocket i could put in my purse um i put in my backpack this one is from michael this is the most beautiful thing i've ever seen thank you so much michael look at this this is poems tonight i have been trying to get my hands on rilka's poems tonight for so long this is the pushkin press edition but it is just beautiful and then there's a nice little quote does the night not blow cool splendidly distant moving across the centuries raise the area of feeling suddenly the angels see the harvest urban summer night moonlit nights night sky and falling star from the periphery nights oh they're just all about night so excited this is like one of the most beautiful editions as well and then because i don't have enough of them we have another edition of letters to a young poet but this one very exciting because i've never had an audition with this this comes with the letters to ilka from the young poet who is this man named um friends kappas and oh my gosh beautiful addition i've never read kappas's letters to rilka i've always been very curious about what he said in them um to prompt such responses and such philosophy and such beauty from rilka so so happy to have this thank you so much and finally um i believe this is also from michael so much i don't know thank you so much i don't know where do you find these where where is the wellspring of rilke that you find these from we have the wisdom arilka the poet's guide to life edited and translated by uh bear he's the one who did the dark interval which is one of my favorite things in the whole entire world um and this is again the really really beautiful um what is this press called modern library he did such beautiful work with the dark interval um and it was just incredible so i cannot wait to read this so thank you so much okay welcome section over do not fear okay and now i'm not one to judge a book by the cover actually i am what am i saying we all are i've had this dress this is my first time wearing this dress no and it's white all right pause everything pause it pause it disaster has occurred okay i think i got it out let me let me show you oh my god this car you're done you're done you're done i think i got it out can you see it was like right here thankfully this is like a sheer sheerish material it seems like vaguely waterproof oh no no no wait can you see that and then it kind of got like right here oh no oh you can totally see that right oh my god actually okay can i show you this dress now that an excuse has happened i can show you it all i know about the nightingale and the rose is that oscar wilde um wrote it into one of his fairy tales right in oscar wilde's fairy tales i'm assuming the nightingale on the rose existed prior to oscar wilde i'm not sure if it didn't that's cool if it did that's also cool but this dress actually is the nightingale and the rose and then it has a nightingale on roses it's like an oscar wild dress that's crazy i found it on thredup i'm just gonna call it my oscar wilde dress but if anyone has any information on this tell me basically okay anyway enough of this this is a book haul i was trying to tell you about this cover um i actually just opened this book yesterday from my p.o box thank you so much this is from michelle um and she said i love these books and i'm determined to make movies out of this way fantasy series i'm trying to raise awareness it's a four book series um i hope you'll read the first and maybe review it because she said she's a filmmaker from la oh my gosh now graphic design may be your passion everyone can cook does not mean everyone should cook but honestly this cover does make me want to read it more i love that like it looks like they photoshopped a purple eye like it looks like a cat's eye or something just over top of this man's face um anyway it makes me very intrigued to read it this is seven citadels i believe is what the series is called and this is book one prince of the god born by geraldine harris we follow prince cherish pampered favorite son of the emperor of galcus and his half-brother forelkin who are sent to find seven sorcerers who each hold the key to a gate legend says that the seven gates imprison a savior who alone can save the embattled galkian empire and its god-born rulers so we follow the two brothers i believe yeah we do follow we set out on an epic journey to save their country um foralken is like the brutish warrior punching man while cherish is um you know kind of the brains to the bronze sort of situation that is that is seven citadels thank you so much michelle okay this one i've already mentioned so i'm just going to go over it very quickly but that is how do you live by against voter yoshino mainly i just wanted to show you the the hardback again because it's just it's so it's the prettiest thing i've ever seen cement truck cement mixer truck a truck that mixes cement i have no idea when the miyazaki film comes out because he uh he came out of retirement to direct this but um yes oh so excited so so excited this is one of the most beautiful books and i've heard that it's perfect to read in the winter so i might try to pick it up this winter next up we have a very intriguing cover with less than zero by brett easton ellis look at this i've never heard this before but it's giving me like cults classic-y vibes oh it is a cult classic okay what i say and a timeless embodiment of the zeitgeist this was published in 1985 filled with relentless drinking in semi bars and glamorous nightclubs wild drug-fueled parties and dispassionate sexual encounters lesson zero narrated by clay an 18 year old student returning home to los angeles for christmas i didn't know this was a christmas book unflinching depiction of hedonistic use um and moral depravity [Applause] it smells really good moral depravity this is giving me like dark academia without the academia vibes i guess i mean he is a student thank you so much we're coming down to the last few books here the first one i have is another canadian book and this is molly of the mall um literary laugh and purveyor of fine footwear by heidi l m jacobs this is set in edmonton this was sent to me by a wonderful subscriber who i believe liv do you live in edmonton am i remembering that correctly um but molly actually works at edmonton mall and if you don't know edmonton mall is canada's largest mall i don't think it's the largest mall in the world because i don't think canada would definitely have that but it is canada's largest mall i remember in like grade three when we had to do cool canadian things like everyone just wanted to go to this mall because it has um like a theme park in there it has restaurants of course it has so many stores i think it has like an ice rink or something like that um anyway back to the book there's your little tidbit of canada molly works at edmonton mall but she hates edmonton a study she finds irredeemably unromantic where she writes university term papers instead of novels and sells shoes at the largest mall on earth oh wait it is on earth nah when this is written there's got to be a bigger mall i don't buy that dubai has probably got something on us 2019 you're telling no way no way does edmonton have the largest mall in the world anyway molly is a very romantic girl she got her name from maul flanders by daniel defoe daffo by daniel the flow daniel the phone i think so anyway i believe there's a lot of romance in here as well because i don't think it's a is it a retelling of mall flanders i don't know it's got really cool things in it though and this just looks so quirky fun um yeah i'm excited to read this actually i really do like books set in malls hotels um restaurants yeah just things like that so that is molly of them all okay then we have this one i'm so excited about someone recommended this to me i can't remember who but thank you so much if it was you and that is earth eater by dolores reyes this is also sent to me thank you so much you guys are just so kind this cover is gorgeous this is another piece of argentinian literature um and i was really drawn to this one because it reminded me so much of 100 years of solitude because in that book there's a character named rebecca and she eats earth she eats the dirt in this one we are following a young woman who also can't stop eating the earth in an unnamed slum in argentina her odd compulsion gives her visions of the murdered and disappeared burdening her with secrets she'd rather not know that just sounds incredible a girl who eats dirt and gets visions of people who have been murdered people who are dead soon enough rumor of her power spreads and desperate members of the community seek out her help to find loved ones and closure oh my god love it i love it i love it already and i haven't even read it thank you so much i think this this is like a five-star prediction so and then we have one that was sent um this is an australian writer i believe this is cloud streets by tim winton thank you so much okay the little blurb on the front says it's a watery epic which makes me excited a broken down house of former glories on the wrong side of the tracks a place teeming with memories of its own from separate catastrophes two families flee to the city and find themselves sharing this great sighing structure okay if it is a book about a house i'm there i'm in it we're in it to win it together they roister and wrangle in a house that begins as a roof over their heads and becomes a home for their hearts well that's poetic okay on the back is compared a little bit to gabriel garcia marquez so i'm there i'm so there um i've not yet read an australian book from my around the world challenge well i read from australian authors but not like like an australian book you know what i mean i don't want to count like never night by jay kristoff towards australia i want something that's like about australia is what i'm kind of looking for for the around the world challenge and i recently got sent so many books from australia so i do have another um around the world book haul idea books from different countries video coming but i've just gotten so many from australia so i wanted to mention cloud street here but thank you so much i'm really excited for this and then finally the last book um this is the gate watch by joshua gillingham look at this cover this is so beautiful i believe this was sent to me from stephanie so thank you so much look at this so pretty this is another canadian um author as well which is fun but this is um clearly taking a lot of information from the vikings from norse myth icelandic saga i believe as well um it says as riddlesome as tolkien we follow tauren 10 trees and his closest companions bryn and grimsa who set out to join the gatewatch and become troll hunters i just love it the first sentence was just so nice because it was describing like the mountain um and look at the maps the missy mountain the mist on the mountain settled low as the damp morning chill turned to drizzling rain i believe stephanie said this was perfect to read in winter um and i cannot it's so pretty i love it so thank you so much oh my gosh narrowly avoided disaster in this video but thank you guys so much for watching um i've just been having a perfectly wonderful wintery time and i hope wherever you are you're staying cold cold well if you want to be cold i really like being cold thank you guys so much for continually throwing books at my face because it just makes it makes up my whole world really so thank you i'm gonna go run this dress through the washing machine and hope the stains come out below you'll find all the books mentioned in this video if you want to check them out if you have any recommendations as usual for any of us please leave them in the comments and yeah i'll see you guys so soon i hope you're having a really great day so much love to you ciao [Music]

Channel: * e m m i e *

Views: 48,197

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Id: f3A-j5GHhww

Length: 27min 18sec (1638 seconds)

Published: Sun Dec 12 2021