Birthday Book Haul!

Made it!! Phew! LOL.

I wasn't sure what to blog about today. After seeing Ames and Leslie's posts, I thought to write about the upcoming new releases I was looking forward to, but those usually end up being long post... and time is short! LOL. In the end, I'll just share my new precious :) It's cool to have a birthday on a Tuesday, because it means new books!!

So here is what I got :)

The Hidden Oracle by Rick Riordan - This book kicks off Mr Riordan's new spin-off series. In the last book of The Heroes of Olympus series, The Blood of Olympus, Apollo angered Zeus. As a punishment, Zeus took away Apollo's immortality and made him human. I really enjoy the world Mr Riordan has created and I'm happy there's more books in it :) I've actually pre-ordered The Hidden Oracle back in January LOL. It's apparently one of the most anticipated books in 2016 and as a result, I save 40%. Win-win!

The Unexpected Everything by Morgan Matson - I first discovered Ms Matson with her debut novel, Amy and Roger's Epic Detour, thanks to Ames. Ever since then, Ms Matson's been on my auto-buy authors list... and with a release schedule of 1 novel every 2 years, let just say I really look forward to her books! As usual, The Unexpected Everything has a cute cover and intriguing blurb :) Looking forward to reading it!

The Earl Takes All by Lorraine Heath - I pre-ordered from Book Depository and so, even though it came out last week, I had to wait for my copy which arrived today. Perfect timing if you ask me! I love Ms Heath's writing... but I have to admit I have some apprehension for this one because of the plot. Nevertheless, I'll probably be picking it up soon since the reviews have been so good :)

Shuffle, Repeat by Jen Klein - For some unknown reasons, I've really been in the mood for YA lately. The only issue with YA books is that they are expensive whether it's the print or e-book version. I had a list of three, four books that came out today and decided to spoil myself by buying one. Shuffle, Repeat had the most promise :) Let's hope I made the right decision!

Voila! Hopefully, they'll keep me busy for the next few days ;)

Hauling Sunday CXXIV

Hey everyone :)

How are you doing? Hope everything is well for everyone :) Me, I feel good which is great and so far, I've managed curling, blogging and reading! Really a great start to 2014 :P Although I have to admit, I have no idea how long I'm going to be able to maintain it ^_^; Especially when you add in the sport watching (tennis and curling) and with the Olympics coming up... However, I'm optimistic :) The only thing I wish I could do better was blog-hopping and commenting. Will have to figure out a schedule for it. What  about you, how's 2014 for you so far?

So this week, I bought some books :) Yay! Indigo/Chapters had a good coupon: Buy 1 and get 50% off the 2nd book... which really, is the same as the "buy 3, get the 4th free" promo. I hope there are going to be some good promotions throughout the year because with the Canadian dollar weakening, books are going to get expensive. Already, I don't save as much on Book Depository... and Berkley has started rising its price on some releases, sigh, and I'm sure they won't be the only one. This year's book-buying is going to be interesting...

This week, I bought some books that I've already read, but wanted to own: The Grendel Affair, How to Run with a Naked Werewolf and The Spider.  When the Rogue Returns was a score, since the book is coming out this Tuesday. Finally, one of my favorite authors, Laura Florand, also had a self-published book out, The Chocolate Temptation, and I snagged it up :)

Any new precious on your shelves?

Hauling Sunday CXXIII

Hi everyone :)

How are you doing? Hope everything's good with everyone :) I'm doing better, on the mend. I had an ultrasound last Tuesday and a follow-up appointment on Wednesday at which time, they removed the drain! Yay!! So I've been taking it easy... and tomorrow, I'll be back to work. Moment of truth I guess LOL. Luckily, my job is flexible, so I'm still planning to take things easy :) The real test I think is going to drive to work... One of the bridges - of course, it has to be the one that I take - is having some issues and two lanes are closed ^_^; Really not a good news, sigh. So we'll see how traffic is going to be, but not looking forward to that :(

In the meantime, I've been reading some new releases and re-reading some old favorites :) I've also taken up crochet :P My sister was looking at video tutorials to make an infinity scarf and I got sucked in. I'm doing a test run and hopefully, it'll turn out good :) Then, I'll buy nicer and bulkier yarn... At least, that's the plan.

Now, look at my new precious!! Luckily, November was a good release month because that got me through :)

What do you think? And what good books did you read lately?!

Hauling Sunday CXXII

Hey everyone :)

So how was your week? And your week-end?

My week was okay, nothing really special happened. I played curling on Thursday and Friday... but on my way to the curling club on Friday evening, there were two spots - one on my back and one near my armpit - that kind of hurt. And after my game, I felt pretty crappy. Hopefully, I didn't push too hard ^_^; I'm kind of concerned I might get a new shingles rash, although it wouldn't make sense given I'm done with the antiviral treatment. Also hoping it's not a complication of shingles. However, it hasn't hurt yesterday and today, so I'll take that as a good sign.

There were a lot of books out on last Tuesday :) Here is what I got:

These were all pre-orders. There's quite a few more books that I want and they should be on their way, coming this week :) Can't wait!

What about you? What did you get? By the way, Ames, Monroe and I have our new releases post up over at Breezing Through! Take a look at it here :)

Hauling Sunday CXXI

Hi everyone!

How are you doing? Yes, I'm still alive and actually doing quite good. Still having some twitches and twinges from time to time, but aside from that, everything's good :) Can't believe it's been two weeks since my last post! I didn't mean to stay absent for so long, but I've been quite busy and my blogging muse is still absent :(

Last week, Ames was in Montreal for a visit! Initially, the plan was to go to NYC and visit Hilcia, Christine and Mariana... However, with the ruptured appendix, we elected to stay in Canada ^_^; So instead, last week-end, we went to Quebec City which was good as well since I got to visit my uncle :) I'll have a post with pictures up some time this week :) Also, curling started again! Yay! I played two games already... Was supposed to play another one today, but I woke up yesterday with some pain on the right side. For a moment, I was afraid it was my appendix getting worst, but after a day of rest, I think it was only soreness. Still, decided to take it easy and got a spare. Seems like I'm going to have to revise my curling schedule a bit ^_^;

Reading-wise, it's been going oh so slowly. Just too busy and not really in the mood. However, that has never stopped me from getting books LOL. So here are my new precious :)

I pre-ordered The House of Hades a while back. Lucky too because at first, I was debating whether to pre-order it or wait till I go to NYC to buy it. In the end, I was able to use a 25% off coupon in addition to the 24% discount we get on books online, so I got it for pretty cheap. It took me a while, but I did finish it yesterday :) I requested The Sugar Cookie Sweetheart Swap over at Netgalley, but really wasn't in the mood to read the proof copy. Thanks to Kobo's coupons, I decided to buy it. I'll be reviewing it once it's read... Probably some time closer to Christmas. I also purchased Broken Silence as an e-book. I mean, it's Karen Rose! Can't wait for Watch Your Back to come out!

Also, as it is customary when Ames comes over, we went to the UBS :) It's been a really long while since I've last been... I was able to pick up High Passion. I read High Risk and enjoyed it and I know Ames liked High Passion... and I was able to find a copy of Sea Swept, trade-size edition. The Cheasapeake Quartet is one of my favorites by Ms Roberts and so I've been eyeing the new trade-size edition ever since they've been released, but 18$ for books that I already have seems a bit steep a price. 3.95$ though was a steal!!

So that's it for me in the past two weeks. What about you? I can't wait till October 29 for release galore! LOL.

Hauling Sunday CXX

Hi everyone :)

So I'm a bit bored and thought I'd write up this post since it's long overdue.

Things are going okay on my end I guess. I'm taking things easy. I'm still paranoid about every twinge and twitch... and turns out I started my periods as well, so that doesn't help matter. Sigh. However, I don't have a fever or more pain, so that's good. Side effects of the antibiotics are still hitting me from time to time, but less, so that's another good thing... Also, it's my sister's birthday today and we're not doing anything... and I feel guilty for it :( Since we spent the week at the hospital, we didn't have the chance to prepare anything. Hopefully, I'll be able to make it up for her when I feel better!

There's a "Buy one book and get 50% off on the second" promotion going on at Chapters/Indigo this week-end, but I don't really have anything to buy. All the books I really wanted, I've already pre-ordered and the others... well they're either not available at the bookstore or I can keep waiting. Plus, it's raining so that's making me lazy...

But here are some new books that found their way to my house...

 

I got Fangirl and Thankless in Death in the mail a while ago, actually before the trip to Washington D.C., but was kind of busy... and then, the ruptured appendix happened and did not have time to blog about it. I've read both books and enjoyed them a lot :) As for Twenty-Eight and a Half Wishes, I just downloaded today on Tabitha's recommendation (yes, she's still alive :P). Lucky too as it was a freebie on Kobo!

So that's it for me right now :) What about you? What new books did you get recently?

Hauling Sunday CXIX

Phew, what a difference does a week make! This week was much better... Actually, not much was going on LOL. My thumb is healing up nicely, work was okay... Noticeable things that happened is that I finally passed level 410 of Candy Crush after being stuck on it for about 2 months! Yay! Then again, credit doesn't go all to me, Candy Crush actually made the level much easier... but I doubt anyone will complain LOL.

Oh, I went shopping yesterday and found a dress for the wedding. Finally!

Honestly, I wasn't sure about it when my sister first showed it to me, but once I tried it on, it fit well :) So sold! LOL. This is actually what I've been looking for, a summer-y dress... So I'm just happy to have found one... Although ultimately, I don't know if it'll be chic enough for the wedding ^_^;; The invitation says casual, but the people showing up... So we'll see :)

All right, now onto the books :)

Interestingly enough, this week is all about self-published ebooks which is a rare thing for me. First is Snow-Kissed, a short story from one of my favorite author, Laura Florand. If I'm not wrong, this one is not set in Paris which will be interesting :) But it still involves food!

I read a good review somewhere for Stay with Me by Elyssa Patrick and the next blog I visited was Brie's and there was a giveaway for Stay with Me. Have to love those coincidence! Even better, I won! Woohoo!

Last but not least is Letters to Nowhere by Julie Cross :) I read Li's review, who by the way loved it, and was intrigued. Then, Brie told me she believed I would love this book... So yep, got it! And of course, they were right, I loved Letters to Nowhere!

So that was my week! What about yours?

Hauling Sunday CXVIII

Hi everyone! :) How is your week-end going? Mine so far has been relaxing which is exactly what I needed after a couple of bad days :( Before I share my woes with you all though, today is September 1... So guess what? Yep, Ames and I have our New Releases post up over at Breezing Through :) Check it out. And if we forgot some good books coming out, let us know!! Because so far, September looks like a lean month ^_^;

Now, onto the books I got this week! :P It was a pretty good week as you can see LOL.

 

Heart of Venom, The Arrangement and The Hero were pre-orders that I've made at Book Depository a couple of months ago. It was nice that they arrived during release week :) Usually, I'll receive them a week after. In any case, I have already read them all :P I bought If You Can't Stand the Heat at the bookstore when I went to renew my membership to Chapters/Indigo irewards program and got a nice 20% off on it. Finally, One Night with a Cowboy is an e-book I bought over at Kobo with a 35% off discount, yay! I read Ms Johnson for the first time in the anthology He's the One and really enjoyed her story, Fish Out of the Water, and wanted more :P

As I said, good week right? Well at least, book-wise... What did you get?

If not for the books, my week would have been quite bleak... I'm going to vent a little, so feel free to skip LOL. Still reading? Brave people :P Well first, I cut myself at work again on Thursday... This time, it was a weird cut because it's actually my nail... The problem is that it hasn't cut through either...

Good news is that it no longer really hurts... Bad news is that I don't really know what will be happening to my nail... someone told me that when it bleeds under, then it'll fall. Guess I'll have to wait and see.

I've been monitoring prices for round-trip flight for my trip to Annapolis. Was going to buy them last week, but we didn't... and on Friday, the prices went up. Ugh. My parents are also planning a trip soon and I didn't have time to buy their tickets on Friday morning... but throughout the day, the price increased! So that was double bummer. My sister and I found another option for our trip to Annapolis, using our miles... so that works out good. As for my parents, there is still some time left to buy their tickets and I'm hoping it's the "week-end effect" that drove the price up and that it'll come down mid-week. But yeah, Friday was very frustrating.

As if that wasn't enough, I've been having some car issues. My AC system has been down the whole summer... and with the season coming to an end soon, it hasn't really been on list of priority to repair. However, I have no control on the cool air either :( It'll sometimes work and then, lose its coolness or just not work at all... We've had rain a few times this week and it's been very humid... Having no control on cool air means that my windows have been fogging up and that's exactly what happened on Friday... It was bad ^_^; So now, getting it fixed has just become a priority, especially since I'm planning a road-trip in October. I can already hear the ca-chink sound of dollar signs, sigh. So on Friday evening, I came home and it was raining really hard with my windows fogged up... Not good. Later, I was going to join my sister at the restaurant, so I decided to take my parents' car, just to be on the safe side. I was a bit surprised because the car was making a weird sound "blop, blop, blop"... So I drove into a parking and got down to take a look... and sure enough, flat tire. Sigh. Apparently, my mom who had driven the car earlier already heard the sound, so it happened while she was driving. Getting on the car, I didn't feel anything different... the car wasn't leaning dramatically to one side or anything. I called my dad and we tried changing the tire to the spare one, but the bolts were screwed really tight. Plus, the tire iron/lug wrench got scraped, so it wasn't possible to do anything with it. So I called for a tow service at 9pm. They told me I'd have to wait for 1.5 hours. Sure, fine, didn't really have a choice... They showed up at 11.30pm ^_^; And luckily, my car had come with my car because the tow guy didn't have a tire iron that fit my dad's car's bolts! So got mine out and it fit! Hallelujah!

Last Friday wasn't Friday 13th, but it sure felt like it...

Hauling Sunday CXVII

Hi everyone!

Sigh, week-end is almost over... Nooooo! Why does it go by so fast? I planned to spend the whole week-end writing reviews, building up a cache of posts... Unfortunately, it did not happen :( Mostly because I've been so tired... I spent Thursday and Friday cleaning out my new lab. As you know, I switched lab at the beginning of the year since my previous boss went back to China. While I started a new position, I had not "physically" moved to my new lab yet and it's to be done this week. But my new lab is like disgusting. There's so much junk everywhere, every drawer is full of stuff... So I wanted to de-junk the lab before I moved and jeez, it's a lot of work. Thrown out sooo much. I was so pumped up on Thursday evening that I did not go to sleep till 1am. I was tired but not sleepy... and then yesterday, went out with friends and again went to bed very late. It's kind of sad how I cannot stay up late anymore otherwise my body and mind are paying for it ^_^;

I'm also going to Annapolis in September for a wedding :) My sister and I are flying to Washington DC and then driving to Annapolis so that means renting a car... and I'm trying to figure out what insurances I need for it. Should I apply for a new credit card that includes some of the coverage? Ugh... anyone has advice? I need to call my personal car insurance to see what coverage I have, but it's soooo much mumbo jumbo! LOL. At least, I have time to figure that out...

This week was a slow week book-wise. There was another 25% off at Indigo and I went to the bookstore to see if there were any books that I wanted... and I ended up buying this one :)

Yet another Harlequin Kiss that caught my attention :) I have to say, I really do love their covers. Anyway, this one sounded interesting... hopefully, it'll be a winner!

What about you? Got any new books this week?

Hauling Sunday CXVI

Okay, so my post is once again late ^_^; And this time around, I have no clever reasoning to justify it LOL. My only excuse is laziness, as usual. Sigh. 

Anyway, here are my new precious of the week :)

As you can see, not a ton of books, but some very good ones :) I requested an eARC for The Chocolate Touch a couple of months ago because I couldn't wait to read Dominique's story, but I did order my own print copy :) Love this series, just a bit sad at the change of covers mid-way :( I also received Guardian Demon in the mail. I'm really excited about this book because it's the last one of the series, but at the same time... not a huge fan of Michael and Taylor. Finally, the big surprise of the week was receiving Omens by Kelley Armstrong, also in the mail. This one is only officially coming out next week... so let see if I can get it read and reviewed for then :P

So that was my new books this week :) What about you? Got any good books?

Hauling Sunday CXV

I know, I know, we are not Sunday. However, I have a long week-end and am only going back to work tomorrow, so today is like Sunday, right? :) Okay, the real truth is I did not manage to get my Week-End's Mini post ready for Saturday as I wanted, so everything was shifted ^_^; However, as I said, today is like Sunday so it works LOL.

Finally, there's been new releases!! Yes!! Seriously, publishing houses need to review their releasing schedules. Not having any new romance books in the middle of the month is practically killing me ^_^; Okay, I'm exaggerating obviously... but it seems to be inducing mini reading slumps :( I know I have a TBR pile and a pretty huge one at that, but it's always so hard to pick up a book from it. So much depends on the mood... While new releases seem to put me in the mood. Does that make sense? LOL.

So here are my new books :)

 In print:

In e-format:

Some Like it Hot and Magic Rises were both pre-orders and I'm so happy they came in promptly. I haven't been in the mood much for historical romance this year, but Love and Other Scandals' blurb caught my attention. It sounds cute and that's why I picked it up today in-store with a nice 25% off coupon. Throughout the week, Kobo offered coupons if you played their trivia game and that's how I ended up buying Her Favorite Temptation and Jeni's Splendid Ice Creams at Home by nice discounts :) I'm actually quite excited for Jeni's Splendid Ice Creams at Home. I used her recipe for the vanilla ice cream and really liked its texture :) Next, I'm going to tackle the pistachio recipe! :)

What about you? Any good books to suggest?


*PS - Her Favorite Temptation by Sarah Newberry is now free on Amazon! Get it while you can :)

Hauling Sunday CXIV

Okay... so this was not how I planned my come-back to blogging after my blogiversary post ^_^; My excuses are the usual: busy and my blogging muse is still on vacation, sigh. However, it's high time I stop complaining and just blog! Warning though, my reviews might come out a bit incoherent LOL.  

Before getting to my new books though, I thought I'd share pictures of what I've been up to lately :) Seriously, I don't know what it is this year, but it feels like my calendar is really full! A bit part is fun like curling, trips and gatherings... but I've got several grown-up appointments as well and that got me running. 

So a couple of weeks ago, we went horseback riding :) It was my first time!

LOL, it was a fun experience and I'll definitively try it again :) Although I have to say, I'm such a city girl!

Then last week-end was a long one so we took the opportunity to get away :P We went to a chalet about an hour away. 

We BBQ-ed... a lot of food LOL. We also did some canoe, played some games, told stories, built a fire, made cookies, chilled in a hot tub and on the side of a pool :) Another experience that I'd repeat, but if we had to go again, I'd love it for a tad longer :)

And yesterday, we went to pick berries! We got lucky and found a place that had both strawberries and raspberries ready for picking at the same time :) However, next year, we probably should go on separate occasions, because it was the first day for raspberries and they weren't as bountiful and sweet as if we've waited one more week. 

We were a bit concerned about the weather initially, but it turned out to be a beautiful day... although a bit warm. And the strawberries were oh so sweet! :)

And here are my constant in life, my new precious from the last couple of weeks :)

 

These were all books I was looking forward to which is why I pre-ordered them LOL. What the Duke Desires is the first book in Ms Jeffries' new series, The Duke's Men. I'm hoping this series hits me better than The Hellions of Halstead Hall. The Newcomer is the newest release by Ms Carr and one I've been really looking forward. I really enjoy the feel of Thunder Point and can't wait to read more about it :) I've enjoyed The Reckless Brides series so far and hope it will continue on with Scandal in the Night... although I don't think there isn't any cross-dressing from the heroine in this one LOL. One of my favorite debut author for 2013 has been Kasie West and she had another book out, this time a contemporary YA. Not my favorite genre, but definitively willing to give The Distance Between Us a try :) And finally but not least, Fifth Grave Past the Light, the newest installment in the Charley Davidson series! Yay! Can't wait to see what Charley is up to!

What about you? Got any good books lately?