Summer of Love?

This was meant to be a review post of sorts. A “I read a bunch of short MM romance stories and wanna talk to you about (I will reference them below)” , not a “This might be the TBR vibe for the rest of Summer” post. Which kinda screws my TBR over as... well... you’ve seen my TBR on Goodreads or Readerly, you would see that I REALLY should tackle my full length stories – you know the ones. The long ones that scare the heck out of me that you all love, but the love and their sizes has kinda scared me (plus the recent UK heatwave threw my reading out).

Like I said, the past few months, I seem to be leaning towards shorter reads. I mean, during my walking holiday in north Wales in June 2021, I read four short stories as part of Prolific Works giveaway: The Day Pass by Slade James (part of the Bear Camp series), Door Number Two by Vinni George (part of the Open Doors series), French Tryst by Isla Olsen and Fan Service by Zoe Lee. They were really short and read one a day (perfect holiday reading) and quickly wrote mini-reviews on Goodreads, most of them I liked and one, not so much. But if you don’t try out new authors, you’ll never know if you’re going to like them (One of the stories made me buy the author’s debut in the series and another has made me researching their current series and go “Where should I start?”)

And recently, I read two more short stories/novellas: The Date by May Archer (prequel novella to the author’s Love in O’Leary series) and Winter Waites by Lucy Lennox (the prequel short story/novella for the author’s Aster Valley series, and yes, I did audiobook the first book in the series, Right as Raine). And both I enjoyed. So much so, I am making plans to read more from them in the coming months so keep your eyes peeled for that. I just need to do some forward planning...

This was meant to be a review for The Date and Winter Waites. Honestly, this was. But I started writing this and went “Actually, I’ve read quite a bit of MM romance since UK first lockdown in March 2020, [though I have dipped toe into these waters before then, but lockdown did something with my reading hence me going hard with KM Neuhold's Four Bear Construction series and my recent discoveries of the Vino and Veritas series and Ana Ashley's Chester Falls series]) and I’m not ready to leave this sub-genre/the genre of romance and go back to YA fantasy/crime just yet. I will, but not yet. It’s summer, I want to read light and summery reads” (I know, dear readers, who have I become?)

So, I have a sneaky suspicion that this summer’s reading will be more on the romance side than my normal fantasy/crime side. Yes, I fear a Summer of Love a-coming.

For this, I would like to apologise in advance for the love hearts/mushiness coming off my blog the next few weeks. Don’t worry, will probably take a tiny blog break sometime during the month (I suspect middle few weeks. I will still be active on social media so keep eyes peeled on that) to get over the sweetness, and I might throw a book or two that have a slightly dark edge/bite that balance out the sweetness. I’m a little surprised on the titles that am leaning towards if my reading gets to sugary... be warned on the sudden reading gear shift (and be warned that I might not review everything I read in the next few weeks on here...)

But August and, maybe, the start of September is going to be a little different reading from me. Brace yourselves!