Hi everyone i'ts Lauren and today I have a book haul video for you. I'm sure I'll
have another one of these videos in January because I have put a couple of
books on me old Christmas list and I also like to treat myself to some books
in January as well because everybody is putting up their best reads of 2017
videos so it just gets me old fingers tingly. But I have been sent some books
by some publishers so I just thought I would show them to you now just in case
you need some ideas for books you might like to gift or some you might want to
gift to yourself. So the first few books I have here really encapsulate that, so
this is a set of books which has been released by vintage classics just in
time for Christmas this year and it is a redesign of some Charles Dickens novels
so this one I have here is Oliver Twist and they've sent me three but there are
six in this in the selection so you have Oliver Twist, Hard Times,
David Copperfield, rGeat Expectations and A Christmas Carol and A Tale of Two
Cities. So these are completely beautiful these cover designs at home and have
been screened printed by print maker Ellie Curtis and they're all slightly
different and have kind of themes from the book in front of them so I think as
a set these are really pretty, especially if you know someone who is really into
Dickens or you knows likes some of these specific books and they have this kind
of black edging here so these are really cute. The next book was sent to me by Pan
Macmillan and that is This is Going to Hurt by Adam Kay, now this is diary
entries from a junior doctor in the NHS and I didn't realize how literal it was
when I looked at this book it really is specific dates and diary entries
spanning a number of years it looks like I recently read When Breath Becomes Air
by Paul Kalanithi, which was about a surgeon who kind of realizes that he's
suffering from cancer so that really piqued my interest in medical writing in
general and this book has been absolutely everywhere, it's had a lot of
hype, a lot of praise and I kind of want to learn a little bit more about the
British NHS service because it's a thing I love and I would really like to
understand what it is like to be a junior doctor because you read a lot of
things in the news and there's a lot a lot of discussions about saving our NHS
and what the government are doing so well nearly lost it
and I would like to read something from the first-hand perspective someone who's
been inside that system. The next lot of books I'm going to show you in two sets
and that's because they've been sent to me from the Costa Book Awards so I'm
really pleased to say that I'm going to be working with Costa this year, which
is something I've not done before and what I'm going to be doing is promoting
two of their specific book awards short list so I'm going to be reading
and reviewing at the First Novel category and the general Novel category
so I have the books that are in those short lists here and so let's start with
First Novel since it's next to me and it kind of works chronologically so the
books they've been shortlisted for first novel are Montpellier Parade by Kyle
Geary and I am currently in the middle of reading this this is set in Ireland
and it's about a young teenager who kind of meets this older posh English woman
their paths collide and then it's kind of about how that's changing both of
their lives so this is quite an interesting one, reserving my judgement
on that one. We also have at The Haunting of Henry Twist by Rebecca F John and
this is about...there's two books here that are set kind of in between the
world wars actually which is very interesting, so this is set in kind of
1926 about a man whose wife dies and then he meets this stranger who can only
remember his name and this Henry Twist's name and so it's kind of unraveling
the mystery behind that, this sounds really interesting and the other book
that fits in that time period is The Clocks in This House All Tell Different Times by
Xan Brooks. Now this, I don't really understand the blurb it sounds like a
young girl kind of goes into the country and meets these odd people and it looks
like it has a lot of references to the Wizard of Oz so I'm really
intrigued by this one and then the last book shortlisted in that category
category is Eleanor Oliphant is completely fine by Gail Honeyman which
I recently read and really enjoyed so I will be kind of reviewing all of these
books in a single video in the next coming weeks. And the next shortlisted
category, the Novel category and I've got four more books here so the first one is
Under a Pole Star by Stef Penney, this is very interesting this is about a woman
who crossed the Arctic Circle and then years later comes back to lead an
expedition into Greenland so it's a historical novel, this is in the 19th
century and to be honest this is probably
something I would never pick up, I'm never really interested in kind of
adventurous novels so I'm quite intrigued by this and I'm very pleased
to have the opportunity to read it. We also have Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie
now this has been everywhere, a lot of praise sung for this book and this is a
modern retelling of Antigone which a lot of people study at school. I've never
actually read Antigone so part of me doesn't know whether why should kind of
look at a plot of Antigone before going into this or if I should just read it
cold but yes, very excited about this one another book which I've already read and
I would highly recommend is Tin Man by Sara Whinman. This is about three young
people, two men and a woman who kind of meet each other fall in love have
different kind of relationships and this is really interesting it's very quiet
novel looking at kind of the nature of love and what love, so that's very
beautiful and the final book on this shortest is Reservoir 13 and by Jon
McGregor, which again has had so much praise, this has appeared on so many
lists of best books that came out last year it was longlisted for the Man
Booker Prize. It's a story about a young girl who goes missing but it's not
really about the tragedy about her it's about all of the people that's left
behind so not just that family but all of the other families in the local area
and how kind of this mystery all this awful thing that's happened has affected
has affected all of them even though their lives kind of continued. So that is
a real mix of genres and styles there for the Costa Awards, it's going to
be really interesting reading all of those books and trying to compare them
with each other. So the winners of all of the different categories are announced
on the 2nd of January and then from the different Costa categories there is
an overall Book of the Year awarded on the 30th of January as well, so stay
tuned for some of my videos on those books. I would love to hear from you if
you've read any of them already some of these have been around for a while and
it's that'd be really interesting I hope that you're all doing well and I'll see
you in my next video bye!