JUNE 2019 - READING LIST AND PICK OF THE MONTH

An enjoyable month's reading - 18 books covered in the month - impressive huh? Not really when you consider 9 of them are sold alone short stories on Amazon and one was a novella weighing in at less than 80 pages. So 8 proper books read in the month.

No 5 STAR READ in the month - but a couple that came very close

4.5 STARS - David Swinson's 3rd Frank Marr book - Trigger and S.A. Cosby's debut novel My Darkest Prayer.

I honestly couldn't split them if choosing one to re-read, so it's either 2 BOOKS OF THE MONTH or none - let's say 2!

4 STAR READS.....
novel - Chris Hammer's Scrubland, 

novella - S.W. Lauden's That'll Be the Day: A Power Pop Heist, 

short story collection - Toni Kan's Nights of the Creaking Bed, 

novella plus short story collection - Graham Wynd's Love is a Grift

short stories - Tim Stevens and Snout, Steve Brewer with 5 solid kick-ass tales - Found Money. Cemetery Plot, Payoff, Love's Gone and Showdown, Shoshana Edwards and Freeze, Mike McCrary with Separate Checks

3.5 STARS - John Brady and Golden Palms

3 STAR READS - Day Keene's There Was a Crooked Man, Joe Clifford's Rag and Bone and an okay short story from Mike McCrary - Broken

I spent time in the company of......

a straight cop turning crooked

a couple of low-level crims with poor decision-making skills

a gaggle of spies with a traitor amongst them

an ex-cop PI and his new recruit, working to clear an old friend

a plethora of Nigerian characters and their trials and tribulations

an undertaker’s assistant with a short fuse and some investigating to do

a lecturer turned political lackey helping the natives in LA

criminals, biker chicks, outlaws, grifters, hit men and more

a grave digger and his intended occupant

a feisty old-timer with a temper and a gun

a couple of drinking buddies and a women who's come between them

two friends - one with a secret, one with a grudge

a gang of old ladies reluctant to say goodbye

a blind women and her support worker

a former couple trying to reconcile or maybe not

a reluctant former pop star unsure of a comeback

a PI type with a long held grudge

an Aussie journalist investigating a mass shooting and its aftermath

Settings...... Haines City, Florida; London; Washington DC; Lagos, Nigeria; Southern Virginia; Los Angeles; Galway, Brussels, Helsinkini, Dundee and more; Oklahoma and Memphis; Ashton, New Hampshire; Riversend, Victoria, Australia and assorted bars, trailer parks, cemeteries, homes, restaurants and more in unspecified locales...

The full list for the month was....

Day Keene - There was a Crooked Man (1954) (3)

Steve Brewer - Found Money (2012) (4)

Tim Stevens - Snout (2012) (4)

David Swinson - Trigger (2019) (4.5)

Toni Kan - Nights of the Creaking Bed (2019) (4)

S.A. Cosby - My Darkest Prayer (2019) (4.5)

John Brady - Golden Palms (2019) (3.5)

Graham Wynd - Love is a Grift (2019) (4)

Steve Brewer - Cemetery Plot (2013) (4)

Steve Brewer - Payoff (2012) (4)

Steve Brewer - Yvonne's Gone (2012) (4)

Steve Brewer - Showdown (2012) (4)

Shoshana Edwards - Freeze! (2013) (4)

Mike McCrary - Broken (2019) (3)

Mike McCrary - Separate Checks (2019) (4)

S.W. Lauden - That'll Be the Day: A Power Pop Heist (2019) (4)

Joe Clifford - Rag and Bone (2019) (3)

Chris Hammer - Scrublands (2019) (4)


If you're not asleep yet - anal analysis for my own amusement - read on if you're an insomniac ......


New to me authors in the month - 6 - Day Keene, Toni Kan, S.A. Cosby, John Brady, Shoshana Edwards, Chris Hammer

I have more on the pile to read from Day Keene

Authors enjoyed before - 7 - Steve Brewer, Tim Stevens, David Swinson, Graham Wynd, Mike McCrary, S.W. Lauden and Joe Clifford

There's more on the TBR pile from 6 of them - Steve Brewer, Tim Stevens, Graham Wynd (or her alter ego K.A. Laity at least), S.W. Lauden and Joe Clifford

18 reads from 12 different authors.
Steve Brewer was read 5 times, Mike McCrary was read twice

2 were series books .....

Joe Clifford's Rag and Bone - the 5th in the Jay Porter series,
Trigger was the 3rd in David Swinson's Frank Marr series

Gender analysis - 2 female authors, 10 male.

Another poor attempt at diversity in my reading! Deja-vous.
It looks like I'll have to sort out another all-female reading month later in the year to address the imbalance.


Of the 12 different authors read, 9 hailed from the USA, 1 from Nigeria, 1 from Australia and 1 from England - as best I can tell.

All 18 of the reads were fiction,

17 of the 18 books read were published this century - this decade
9 from 2019, 1 from 2018, 2 from 2013 and 5 from 2018

1 book was from 1954,

1 came from the man-cave blue tub stash in my garage.
Day Keene's There Was a Crooked Man

Publishers -  Mulholland Books x 1, Fox Spirit Books x 1, Cassava Republic x 1, Oceanview Publishing x 1, Wildfire x 1, Intrigue Publishing x 1, Universal Paperbacks x 1, Certified - Human - Books x 1, Bad Words Inc x 2, 7 probably 8 via Amazon Media - 1 has been removed from sale so who knows?

(A few of the above probably pass as self-published but I'm fine reading that.)

4 of the 18 reads were pre-owned,

1 was accessed at Net Galley early reviewer site, cheers to publisher Mulholland Books. I actually ran out of time reading it so had to by myself a copy to finish

2 were accessed at Edelweiss - Above the Treeline, early reviewer site, thanks to Oceanview Publishing and Cassava Republic

1 was a review copy courtesy of Reedsy Discovery website

1 was received directly from the publisher - cheers to Fox Spirit Books

1 was borrowed from Leighton Buzzard Library

9 were read as part of a month long Kindle Unlimited trial

Favourite cover? David Swinson - Trigger

 Second favourite cover -  Toni Kan - Nights of the Creaking Bed

My reads were this long 112 - 11 - 33 - 352 - 176 - 222 - 288 - 256 - 11 - 14 - 9 - 11 - 14 - 20 - 18 - 74 - 256 - 500

Total page count = 2377 (1712 in May) ....... an increase of 665 pages

10 were Kindle reads, 2.5 were ePub files read on the laptop,  2.5 were paperbacks, 2 were PDF files and 1 was a hardback

9 < 50,
1 between 51 < 100,
2 between 101 < 200,
4 between 201 < 300,
1 between 301 < 400,
1 > 400 pages

Chris Hammer and Scrublands was the longest read at 500 pages

Steve Brewer with Yvonne's Gone was the shortest at 9 pages long.