Welcome back to Boot Break! It is time for our monthly book haul, only this
month we're doing it a little bit differently. So as we're not in the
office right now I can't open a massive box of books like I usually do, so
instead, Elle, the other half of the book break team has sent me a very exciting
email which I'm. just about to open on camera and she has filled that email with book
covers of some of the most exciting books we've published recently so we're
gonna find out about these books together right now. Okay so I've got my
laptop, we're going in. Oh that first one's so lovely so this is
Only You by Kate Eberlen, so I haven't read this one yet but I keep wanting to
and I love this cover with the dancing and the tagline 'one person is all it
takes to change a lifetime'. So what I think I know about this one is it's a
bit like One Day in that you're checking in with these two people across their
lifetimes. So it's these two people Letty and Alf and they're both English
but they meet in Rome and they discover this shared love for dance and then over
the course of the book we check in with them over the years and see how their
lives have progressed separately and if they'll cross back over. I love that kind
of thing so I'm so excited to read this one. Next we have a David Baldacci, Walk
the Wire. So this is an Amos Decker book I think this is number six in the series
now. So the Memory Man series is about an FBI agent called Amos Decker who has a
perfect memory which obviously makes him such a fascinating character to read
about so yeah this is the sixth one in the series it's about him investigating
a brutal murder. Oh next we have Cleanness by Garth Greenwell.
I love the orange of this cover and this is another one that I haven't read
yet but I'm so excited to. So Garth Greenwell is this beloved literary author and
Cleanness is a series of vignettes about this one man's life who's an
American teacher but living in Sofia in Bulgaria. So the novel is made up of
these various interconnected moments from his life that explore the theme of
connections with other people. Ooh okay next is a Linda Porter
this is Mistresses: Sex and Scandal at the Court of Charles the Second. That is
a great cover as well. So Linda Porter is a historian who's
written these amazing biographies of women like Mary Tudor and Catherine Parr
and then Mistresses is about the women who shared Charles II's
bed and the influence that they actually had over the politics of the
country. That is bound to be absolutely fascinating but I also just love that
cover and the title it's like so eye-catching. Ok Girl in the Rearview
Mirror by Kelsey Rae Dimberg, so this must be the paperback. So this is a thriller,
a political thriller, about a woman who gets involved in this very high-profile
political family she works with them as a nanny I believe but she obviously has
secrets of her own in her own past so the more tangled she becomes in the
scandal and the drama of this family she's still trapped because she can't
risk destroying her new life that she's worked so hard to build. Sounds fantastic.
Oh Deeplight! Oh this is beautiful so this is the paperback of Deeplight by
Frances Hardinge. This is such a gorgeous cover, I loved the hardback cover as well,
but this one's so intriguing. So Deeplight is a dark fantasy which is what
Frances Hardinge is best at. So this is about these two friends who live in the
world that used to be ruled by these cruel and powerful Gods who have now
lost their power, but you can find relics of them under the sea, and so these two
friends make their living by diving under the sea and finding these relics
that they can sell. But one day they come across a relic that holds a very
dangerous power. OK what do we have next? This is the new Marie Kondo.
This is Joy at Work. So Marie Kondo is obviously the author of the
Life-changing Magic of Tidying Up but this one is all about organizing your
professional life. So I think both in terms of literally tidying your
workspace and making a nice place for you to work but also organizing your
whole life at work. So she's worked with an organizational psychologist on this
book so it's full of amazing advice and Marie Kondo's books always genuinely make
me so happy. Right, next we have, oh The Moment of Lift byMelinda Gates, so
this is the paperback it looks really really different from the hardback. So
this was the hardcover, now we've switched to this really pink cover I
love this. So this is about how empowering women changes the world. I
actually talked about this book recently in the video that was all about books
that empower you, so I'll link to that below, go and watch for loads more
recommendations like this. This is basically - Melinda Gates has done a ton
of research, met with loads of women living totally different lives all
around the world, and found that they all have one thing in common, which is basically
if we start listening to the needs of women, prioritizing and empowering
them, the whole world does get better. OK next in here is the paper back of
From the Wreck by Jane Rawson, I actually have the hardback right here, but now we've
got the paperback coming out. So this one was on the short list for the Kitschies
Awards this year which are awards for speculative fiction. This is a kind of
sci-fi historical fiction novel, very popular with booktuber Simon Savidge, he
absolutely loved this one. It's based on a real shipwreck but it's got this kind
of fantastical element, so I think whether you love historical fiction or
sci-fi or fantasy or are just looking to go outside your genre comfort zone a bit. there is
something in here for everyone. Okay then we have A Nearly Normal Family. Wow so
this is the paperback cover and again it's so different. So this was the
hardback cover and now we've moved to this really fun vibrant bright cover for
the paperback, this looks great. So I have read this one: this is a thriller
that's told in this really fun unique way, so it's divided into three sections
and we hear the perspectives of the mother the father and the teenage
daughter of this family where the teenage daughter has been accused of a
murder. But it builds so much tension the way that it's told one perspective at a
time because each time you start again with a new character you're hearing a
slightly different version of events and so you will change your mind so many
times about what you think, who you think is guilty or innocent, which is really
summed up by this tag right on the front: Who's telling the truth? You'll have to
read it to decide. Then we have, oh, the next in the Macmillan Collector's Library
so this is the Iliad that's so exciting. So stories about the Trojan War and
Greek mythology in general are so popular right now, with books like A
Thousand Ships and Song of Achilles. We actually have a whole video on Greek
retellings which I will link to if you want to go and check that out. But now
I've been working my way through so many of those, I actually feel really really
compelled to go back and read Homer's The Iliad, and I'm sure loads people feel the
same. So, great to have a little Macmillan Collector's Pocket Edition to take
around. Oh and then on that theme we also have the Aeneid by Virgil. This is
another epic story from Greek mythology about a Trojan hero Aeneas, I remember
learning about Dido and Aeneas at school but I don't know much else about the
story so definitely gonna have to check this one out.
Oh another fun bright one, this is Yes You Can
by Natasha Devon. Yes You Can ace your exams without losing your mind. So this
sounds absolutely brilliant for anyone going through the exam period and
especially right now when things are so strange and different to normal
Natasha Devon is a mental health campaigner. She's absolutely brilliant, I
did a video with her two years ago for her book A Beginner's Guide to Being
Mental, so again I will link to that you want to go and check it out. But this one
is all about exams. I definitely could have done with something like this when
I was going through taking my exams so I think this will be so helpful for so
many people. Next we have a Campbell book, My
Favourite Dinosaur. I'm so sad not to actually have this one with me because I
love playing with these, they're always so interactive. But you can see on the cover
here it says 'turn the wheel to choose' so it's going to be really hands-on. These
books are always so creative and fun. And then another Campbell one, this one looks so
fun, so this is My First Heroes: Artists. and it's a way to discover really amazing
people, really amazing artists who might be your child's role models. So on the
cover here we have people like Van Gogh and Frida Kahlo. That looks great and I
imagine even more exciting actually having the physical version and being
able to play with it. OK this one, The Joy Journal for Magical Everyday Play.
This is by Laura Brand, so this is another book which is fantastic anyway but
especially right now, it is filled with really creative craft ideas for playing
with your children, which especially right now when people are really
struggling to come up with ideas to keep their children entertained all day,
this sounds perfect. Even if you don't have children some of the activities in
here I kind of want to try it out. OK next we have Funny Weather by Olivia
Laing, ok, Art in an Emergency. So this is an essay collection all about the
importance of art in guiding us through what has been a very turbulent political
climate for the last few years and just increasingly so. I also think once again
it's kind of perfect timing for a book like this because right now art is even
more important than usual to so many people. OK next we have, oh, The Yellow
Bird Sings by Jennifer Rosner. So this one looks so sad and beautiful. So this
is about a Jewish woman during the war who has to go into hiding with her very
young daughter, and so they have to not make a noise, and so to keep her daughter
calm and quiet she tells her these stories about a girl
who lives in an enchanted garden and can't make a noise but
has this yellow bird who can sing the songs that she composes in her head.
And you can see from the cover here such a beautiful image of that yellow
bird kind of bringing the flowers to life in this otherwise really bleak
situation. I haven't read this book yet I'm gonna have to get the tissues to the
ready, but I've heard it's so beautiful and it is ultimately a really hopeful
story which I think you can really tell from the cover. OK next we have Rules
for Being a Girl, this is by Candace Bushnell, author of Sex and the City,
and Katy Cotugno, and it's a YA novel about a teenage girl who basically
writes this article for her school newspaper exposing the sexism at her
school and she writes this series of rules for what it's like being a girl.
This is another book I mentioned in that video about empowering books that I mentioned
earlier, and that is linked below, because this is all about how she actually
brings together a group of allies to actually change things. OK and then I
think this is the last one. It's my favourite! It's The Adventures of the Little Wooden
Horse! I didn't even know we were publishing a new version of this. That's
just made me so excited, this was my childhood favourite book. So this is a
brand new edition that apparently has the original inside illustrations. I love
that so much. This is such a sweet and sad story about a little wooden horse
who sets off to try and make his fortune and bring money back to his beloved maker
Uncle Peder. But along the way just everything that could go wrong goes
wrong for him it is unbearable but it's such a wonderful story. So that's it! That
was our virtual book haul. Hopefully you enjoyed that new virtual format, let us
know in the comments what you thought, but I really enjoyed going through those book
covers that was a really fun surprise for me. And as always we would love to
know what books you've hauled this month or what you're particularly excited about.
So do chat to us in the comments and then click through to browse our
playlist of all of the book haul videos we've done so far. See you next time.