Love your videos! Always makes me feel happy and just feels like I’m listening to a friend have a catch up! ☺️

I hear you on the whim problem, Simon. When I’m bereft after finishing a great book, I just endlessly stare at my shelves and don’t know where to start

The Night Alphabet is SO GOOD and I hope you love it. I’m seeing her do a performance piece that’s been put together for the book next weekend, and I’m so excited for it!

Loved this catch up and I’ve Damaged a couple of books. Current read was a “love the cover” choice and it’s good. Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt.

You are making me feel great since I’ve read 31 books so far!!! My only excuse is I read for enjoyment and embracing retirement! My favorite book so far this year is, The Heaven and Earth Grocery Store( my prediction for the Pulitzer)

On the whim thing.... I tend to make wishlists and then reserve lots from my library. I have a reading order list then - which is mainly determined by the number of other users waiting for me to return them, as I can't renew those ones! 😂❤

I DNF'd the Luminaries. Absolutely LOVED BIRNAM WOOD!! Can't wait to hear your thoughts!

I had a similar response to Carys Davies' Clear. That rarest of treasures: the perfect novel. And a rare case of me preferring the US jacket design. My other top read for 2024 books: James by Percival Everett. Hard to imagine any book replacing these two at the top of my end-of-year book list for 2024 titles. Birnam Wood was in my top 3 reads of 2023. The final third is nonstop white-knuckle reading, cementing it as a classic of the literary thriller genre. The last 10 pages are legendary.

Yes please to a Carys Davies video.

Clear is my favourite book of the year so far - by a long way and I’m on 26 books. Absolutely wonderful.

I really enjoy unedited Simon, I have to say! Much cackling with glee while watching. If you like memoirs by poets, I can heartily recommend There’s Always This Year by Hanif Abdurraqib, which was stunningly written. Must get my hands on The Night Alphabet. I have been recommending Clear and I Who Have Never Known Men widely.

The only thing I would like to see more of is you having fun, when you are feeling it of course, which hopefully translates to your life at large. Not performative, just real❤

Kate Grenville thoughts are spot on Simon. It felt quite done before.

Fab video! I have been rather enchanted by the international Booker this year....just when I thought the womans prize was enough 😅...and now you tell me about the Carol Shields 😂😂😂 oh my!❤

It's one of my favourite things in life, being bowled over by a book. Happened most recently with The Hoarder by Jess Kidd, it's definitely a favourite of the 31 books I've read so far in 2024. Perhaps boring, but keep up the fab work! Always interesting to hear your thoughts on reading, like DNF-ing, and hear about new books, love how you highlight and talk about books beyond the ones "everyone" talks about.

Love the intention of being kind to yourself! I enjoy watching whatever ramblings about books and things you get up to. That's not very constructive of me, but I'm not gonna beat myself up about it. I really want to read Cleopatra & Frankenstein and The Night Alphabet. And Sociopath.

Love that you got to Cleo and Frank, can’t wait for Blue Sisters. Your Women’s Prize plan sound like mine which I’ve currently put on hold. Love the sound of videos.

A video of reading highlights would be lovely!

Well that's a first! Hope you like Night Alphabet now.

I hope you get at least a 4.0 year, Simon 🥰 But you are so right that taking chances with books is “risky” with a goal like this. But hey, nothing wrong with trying different things if that’s what tickles your fancy really. And if you’re excited about it then that’s great! Bc as you said it can be a hit which I’m so happy to hear that you experienced with Cleo+Frank. And I can’t wait to read it as well! - So many of my five star reads have been non-fiction, a highlight so far of each would be Freedom is a Constant Struggle by Angela Davis (audio) and Against the Loveless World by Susan Abulhawa. Also, I’d love an authors spotlight 🤩 Sounds fab! And doing highlights and revisiting your intentions are also great ideas! Plus, your reel was as much a delight as you are 🙌

I, too, for some reason, steered away from Cleopatra and Frankenstien, although I adore books set in New York. I then saw someone who I also follow and trust raving about Coco Mellors' second book Blue Sisters. She said it was her favourite book of the year so far. So I have now purchased Cleopatra and Frankenstein, and it's my next planned read....so fingers crossed!

Loved this! I feel the same about reading by whim or slightly more structured than you. I create loose monthly TBRs for myself because otherwise I would just get lost in the overwhelming amount of books on my TBR lol. One of my intentions for this year was to buy less books and read more from my TBR, but I just came home from 10 days in Scotland and I brought back 42 books lol. Let's just say this trip was always going to be the exception, since I knew I wanted to go to all the bookshops you highlighted in your Edinburgh vlog hahaha. Can't say at all that I'm mad about it, but hopefully I'll do a liiiiittle better in the coming months 😂. Can't wait for your thoughts on all the long/shortlists, although hopefully there won't be too many stellar ones I don't own yet, or I'll be in trouble again lol. 😅

I'm so glad you said that about Restless Dolly Maunder, I almost took another (unread) novel by Kate Grenville to a charity shop but will now give it a go.

I discovered Carys Davies thanks to The Artist Formerly Known as Your Mother. I would enjoy watching a video dedicated to her books.

I'm currently reading O Caledonia because it was very highly recommended and I am having a hard time getting into it - at 1/2 way through I've almost abandoned it a few times. I am so surprised because so many people recommended it to me! Thank you for sharing your opinion - I was beginning to think it was me.

Love you Simon! I enjoy your posts on instagram ( I care ) --- I understand what you mean about stage fright on instagram. I post a little now but I start to post more and then I second guess myself and say who cares-- but then there are somethings we should do just for ourselves. It's nice to have a record of what's going on and look back every now and then ( but not all the time ). I like that you are DNFing more. I am having a dilemma right now about a book that I can see has a significant point but I don't care for the writing style at all. I am going to give it another 10 pages and DNF-FN (for now)....maybe I will find it more interesting before I unhaul some books again. Have a beautiful day and weekend.

I just bought Cleopatra and Frankenstein on Kindle for 99p so thank you for the recommendation!

1. I've finished 28 books so far this year, which makes me feel very accomplished, but I have to admit some of them were smaller books (not novels). 2. Favourites: I just finished A Psalm for the Wild-Built, and A Prayer for the Crown Shy by Becky Chambers and it lived up to the hype. Between the two, I might have preferred the second book slightly, because the robot is there the whole time. Who knew that a robot could be the character that has the most heart in all of the books I've read this year? 3. Disappointments: On the flip side, The Wishing Game was a big let-down. I do not get why this book gets a 4.13 average rating on Goodreads. I found the story shallow and problematic. Oh, and I have to lump The Thursday Murder Club novel in there as well. This book was just trying to darn hard to be funny and cool, but I feel like it missed the mark. 4. Genres: So far, I've read biographies, Contemporary Fiction, one classic (Passing), a few documentary books (one about the 50 years of La Ronde, Montreal's amusement park), a book of essay, some fantasy, sociology and sci-fi. 5. A book that surprised you: Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson. I thought a book about such a serious subject would be very dry, but the author made the subject very approachable, while still being well researched. As a Canadian, I'm fairly familiar with the United States, but this book really deepened my understanding of how the caste system influences many spheres of the politics and the economics and helped me better understand what we have seen at play during the last two election rounds. This turned out to be a very enlightening read. 6. 2024 book I want to read: Why We Read: On Bookworms, Libraries, and Just One More Page Before Lights Out from Shannon Reed. 7. One goal you made that you are succeeding in? Making time to read. 8. One goal you need to focus on: Getting back to exercising. I just discovered my library's free audiobook collection (even though the English selection is sadly lacking.) Maybe that's what I needed to do better on this goal?

I couldn’t read The Luminaries despite trying so many times BUT I Loved Birnam Wood I cant wait to hear what you think about it. I am having such a reading jitteriness I start a book and then give up thinking meh😅. Crime fiction always saves me. I loved The Berry Pickers by Amanda Peters it was so much more than a crime novel dealing with the treatment of Native American people C

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Hi Simon Love from Thailand.😊 We are celebrating the songkran water splashing festival now. 😂 my suggestion would be along lines of you wanting to read more by whim. Why not just switch the camera on, look through your shelves (only one cubbyhole/section ) and choose a book?. Maybe once a month? That way you work through your unread books. 😊❤

Hi Simon . So far I have read 38 books and Tom Lake by Ann Patchett with Thornton Wilder’s Our Town was a combo five star read for me 🎉. Least favorite ? Not too sure will tell you later this week . A History of Burning looks amazing 🎉

Simon I’m reading on a whim. I have been wanting to read fun beach reads with romance in them. It’s been raining where I am so I have been wanting to read some Summer books 🏖️

Just read West by Carys Davies and really rated it as I do Clear. Loved its quirkiness.

I picked up Clear after seeing you speak so highly of it. I’m about 25 pages in and loving the writing style. If I can offer a fantasy suggestion, it would be either The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern or, even better, The Book of Doors by Gareth Brown. I haven’t finished it yet, but I’ve heard people say it’s an excellent gateway into fantasy that doesn’t go too far down the fantastical rabbit hole.

Would love an intentions update! 🤗

Agree re Restless Dolly Maunder - this was my first Kate Grenville book. What would you recommend I try of hers?

I’ve read 45 books but dnfed a lot as well I’ve read the woman’s prize books

Got me curious about my numbers 🤔 39 read and 13 dnf x

You are doing brillantly with your channel. I also think about posting on insta then don't do it.

An enjoyable watch, but I just wanted to say that I think the original creator of this booktag is Roisin's Reading.

You could honour your whim commitment by creating a brief Short for each one you finish with a thumbs-up- thumbs-down to camera at the end to show a very basic verdict. Wd esp work for dnfs I think 🤔

I get the whim overthinking what to read next

is it good or bad to read more or less books in a year? I've read some long, brilliant and luscious books this year which took time to get through and absorb...Brotherless night was the best..

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Thankfully, I am reading the 1996 Pulitzer Prize Winner The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields, after attempting to read a book that is over-hyped and has turned out to be a stinker. I waded through the pile for a quarter of the book, without much happening, nor much of a discernible plot. I DNF'd the trite, trashy and terribly written example of hype gone wrong. Hint to young writers, giving your characters potty mouths, does not make them look cool, makes you both look like you have a poor vocabulary and loses any shock value real fast. Never again, another one for the drivel dam. A waste of money, but even bad writers need sustenance, bad editors, not so much..😂