ICYMI :: June Wrap Up

Can you believe it’s July already? We’re past the halfway mark of the year, on school holidays, just back from a week visiting my family for the first time in a while, and enjoying a week of lovely Canberra winter weather (frosty nights and cold clear sunny days – my fave!).

I know not everyone is a fan of winter but there is something about the end of June/start of July that just makes me feel more like myself – like I can stretch out and take up space and just enjoy myself. Perhaps it’s that we’re past all the business of birthdays and Easter and all the things we pack into the start of the year, and instead are hunkered down and enjoying slow moments. We’re settled into a school routines, and the winter solstice always feels like fresh new beginnings to me.

Now that we are a week into July I thought I’d pop in and share a quick wrap up of what I shared here on the blog during June. It was kind of a weird month for us – I’m sure many of my fellow Aussies can relate to the stress of trying to figure out school holiday travel plans this time around, with lockdowns and restrictions changing almost daily. As a result of being preoccupied by all that I feel like I had kind of a quiet reading month, often popping the tv on in the evenings instead (we have been loving Whitney Port’s reaction videos as she watches her way through The Hills with her husband).

I have continued to enjoy sharing FRIDAY FAVOURITES each week – although I did miss one in the midst of the “last day of school are we going away what is happening” panic. My favourites in June were:

• 4 June – my 7 year-old’s sneaky reading under the covers habit
• 11 June – fresh flowers
• 18 June – picking up my knitting

Like in May, I only managed to get two REVIEWS up in June – both for books I adored (and with thanks to Allen & Unwin for sending me copies of both of these books):

• Nancy Business by RWR McDonald
• Magpie’s Bend by Maya Linnell

I also had the pleasure of sharing an AUTHOR Q&A with RWR McDonald, where we chatted a bit about The Nancys, Nancy Business and writing in general – you can find it here.

There were also a couple of books I was so excited to be getting into in June, that I couldn’t wait to finish before I talked about them here – I shared a CURRENTLY READING post about When Days Tilt, which is the first book in Karen Ginnane’s LoveOzYA historical fantasy duology Time Catchers, and a PREVIEW of Leonie Kelsall’s new novel The Wattle Seed Inn. This was one of my most anticipated new releases for the year, and if you’ve checked out my Instagram page in the past few days you’ll already know I loved it. Reviews for both of those novels will be here soon.

As well as those two reviews, I have a few others to catch up on, especially picture books which I just seem to have trouble keeping up with. I’m rather tempted to share some Christmassy reads this month too – I have a bit of a backlog of cozy Christmas romances on my kindle that I thought I might try and dip into in honour of Christmas in July. I do love a theme, and looking forward I’m thinking maybe I might dedicate more time in August to reading some Aussie rural romance.

As always, I’d love to hear what everyone has been reading/enjoying over the past few weeks – do leave a comment if you’d like to chat!

xo Bron