Oh my goodness you guys… I had so much on my mind yesterday that I completely forgot about the Show Us Your Books link up! Me. Forget about books. How mad is that? Luckily it’s still open today. (Not that I actually read much in May, but it’s the principle!)
I read a grand total of three books in May. Wow. I’m not sure I’ve read so few books in a month since I learned to read! I was busy with cross stitch, but also I was attempting to read Sophie’s World, which took forever. So I eventually decided to take a break from it and read some quick books. And here they are:
Alfie Bloom and the Secrets of Hexbridge Castle by Gabrielle Kent. I absolutely adored this book. There just aren’t words to express my adoration! It has all my favourite ingredients: a mysterious benefactor, a surprise inheritance, good friendships, magic, intrigue and a sprinkling of myths and legends. The parents are not absent/oblivious to what their kids are up to (there is a lot of sneaking around and comments like “if our parents knew we were going to do X, they wouldn’t let us go where we’re going!). And, the cherry on the top for me, partway through the book I found out that the fictional village of Hexbridge is located in the north-east of England (they mention Newcastle being half an hour away). A little piece of home – yay! I am dying to read book 2, but I’m reserving it for Erin’s next challenge. 5 stars for this one. Highly, highly recommended for anyone aged 10 years and up.
Cross My Heart and Hope to Die by Sara Shepard – Book 5 in the Lying Game series. By this stage the series was starting to drag. It was nice to find out more about Becky in this book, but other than that it wasn’t as good as book 4. In this book, it became entirely obvious who the murderer was (no spoilers here though!). 3 stars.
Seven Minutes in Heaven by Sara Shepard – Book 6 in the Lying Game series. I read this book immediately after the last one because I wanted to finally get to the end! I actually really enjoyed this one, despite being annoyed by the solution (again, no spoilers here!). I felt really sad for Sutton in this one, having to watch her family find out she was dead and then attend her own funeral. I am not ashamed to admit I cried at the funeral and the Christmas scene at the end. Poor Sutton, poor Mercer family. *Sniff* 5 stars for this book. As for the series, all in all it was okay but it really didn’t need to be a whole six books long! I’ll give it 3.5 stars because, while a few of the books were excellent, others were not.
And that was it. I also continued reading Sophie’s World and The Sense of Style in May, and finally finished them earlier this month, so I will be able to review them in the next link up 🙂
Linking up with Jana and Steph. Check out their blogs to see what everyone else read in May.
Confuzzledom 
Thank you SO much for your lovely comments on Alfie Bloom! And yep, I see Hexbridge as being located around Hexham/Corbridge area. The third book involves a trip to Staple Rock among the Farne Islands, but I renamed it Demon Rock as my publisher wanted something more dramatic 🙂
Gabrielle x
Ooh, exciting – I can’t wait to read it 🙂
I haven’t been to the Farne Islands in years – must remedy that.
I like that – even though you may not have read many in May, it’s still the principle of linking up and sharing! (I didn’t read many in May either…)
Surely based on Hexham!?!?!??! My husband’s home town! I also want to go to the Farne islands! I KEEP saying i want to go and see the puffins!
I gave up on Sophie’s World. I became so distracted by it. I love Jostein Gaarder’s books but this one had be stumped!!
The first comment on this post was from the author (squeeee!!) who says she sees at as being around the Hexham/Corbridge area, so not necessarily Hexham but near there.