14 New Books: My Hiemal Book Haul

14 new books make up my Hiemal Book Haul and includes books I’ve purchased from August to November. The most prevalent themes are fantasy and (as always) romance.

Overview

I’m loving my new habit of using quirky and obscure words to describe my book hauls 😊. Hiemal means “of or relating to winter” which is perfect as we transition into the winter and holiday season.

I had a light book ban in place from my last book haul back in May until the end of the summer. While I did buy other books, all, except the ones included in this haul, were read immediately. Therefore, I’m classifying my book buying ban as a success.

To break down this haul, here are a few standouts:

Most Anticipated? She Who Became the Sun by Shelley Parker-Chan. Mulan is my favourite Disney princess so it’s no surprise I adore Mulan retellings. I’m really excited to read a historical fantasy, especially one that reimagines the rise of the Ming Dynasty’s founding emperor.

Longest Book? The Wolf and the Woodsman by Ava Reid at 448 pages.
Shortest Book? Theory by Dionne Brand at 240 pages.
Average Book Length: 362 pages

After discussing the themes of this haul, I split the haul into two stacks based on whether they’re physical books or ebooks. My Heimal Book Haul comes to a total of 14 books!

Prevalent Themes

Physical Books

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eBooks

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Summary

I always love documenting the prevalent themes in my book hauls because I can see what my reading mood was when I purchased them. Since the pandemic began, lighter novels with sweet romances have been Nº1 on my books read list. However, I’m happy that this haul documents a return to deeper character-driven novels including a thriller/mystery (a very rare genre for me), YA coming-of-age and some high fantasy.

To Look Forward To

Putting off buying a slew of books for so long made me a firm believer that book buying and reading are two completely separate hobbies. Considering I have so many books on my Up Next Shelf, I’m hoping I get in the mood to read high fantasy and deeper character-driven books soon.

However, there are a few books from this haul that I’m purposely differing until the week of Christmas. With the number of applications I need to get done in the first half of December and my looming deadlines, I’m doing my future self a favour and not prioritizing reading until my break.

As always, my goal is to read more from my Up Next Shelf and I think I’ve found a really fun way to do that! TBR jars have become a staple in the bibliophile spaces of social media. To accommodate for my mood reading tendencies, I’m planning on using a TBR prompt jar. I’ll draw three prompts at the beginning of each month and the books that fulfill those prompts will make up my minimum to-be-read list. Of course, all the books must be from my Up Next Shelf.

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