Welcome to another book-loving edition of My Favourite Reads. I had a bit of a slack reading month in May. Between finishing CHRISSY AND THE BURROUGHS BOY, completing second round edits on THE COUNTRY GIRL and touring visitors around the Blue Mountains and Sydney, I was a tad busy! But the books I did finish were fab and one of them was so big it surely counts as two anyway.

So, without further rambling, my favourite read of May was…

It Ends With Us by Colleen Hoover

I loved this book so much. It’s powerful, wonderfully written and will make you think very hard about domestic abuse. In fact, I’m still thinking about the dilemmas drawn in this story and my reactions at different points. As for the ending… the message from that will stick with me always. It’s that important.

This is one of those rare books where I wish I had it in paperback so I could easily flip back and forth through the pages and make notes as I try to work out what Hoover did to make the tension so strong. Not only the tension but my empathy for the characters. At times it made me so anxious that the moment I set the book down all I wanted was to snatch it back up again and make sure everyone was okay.

I’m afraid to talk too much about the plot or the characters in case I give anything away, but I will say that Lily is incredible. She strong, smart and kind and makes you cheer like crazy for her.

If you get the chance, read this. It’s special.

NOS4R2 by Joe Hill

Joe Hill is one of my favourite authors and his novels are an auto-buy for me (Horns is one of my all-time favourite reads), so it’s kind of weird that I’ve had this copy of NOS4R2 sitting on my shelf for well over a year. But it was just so huuuuuuge. I bought it in paperback because the ebook was priced ridiculously, but at nearly 700 pages this thing is heavy and I knew trying to hold it in bed (my preferred reading space) would give me the irrits. I kept putting it aside, promising I’d read it on holidays or something, until last month when I went “stuff it”, and picked it up.

Hill is such a brilliant storyteller and writer that NOS4R2 was easily worth the hand contortions and getting smacked on the nose every time I lost my grip. This book is scary, funny, suspenseful, action-packed, and even sweet in spots, and the characters are brilliant. I loved Vic – what a heroine! – and Charlie Manx was a blast as the villain, along with Bing. And Lou was… well, I’ll let you find out.

A wonderful horror novel.

Dirty by Kylie Scott

Ooh, this was a blast. Great premise with a runaway bride and a sexy musician, and a solid romantic conflict to keep me worrying that the hero Vaughan and heroine Lydia might not get the happily-ever-after they clearly deserve. But what stood out was the dialogue. This is snappy, clever stuff and hugely entertaining.

Lydia’s voice was brilliant. She’s sassy and smart and likeable, and I loved her from the get-go, while Vaughan is hot-hot-hot but also decent and kind.

I gobbled this down in no time and finished it with an enormous smile on my face.

I’m adding the next book Twist to my to-be-read pile.

The Rose Garden by Susanna Kearsley

With completion of The Rose Garden I’ve now read every Kearsley release. Rah! On the other hand, that means I’ll have to wait until she puts out another, which, from her website, looks to be called Bellewether. No news on when it’s coming but I hope it’s soon. I’m a total fangirl.

In case you’re wondering, The Rose Garden was lovely and romantic and a gorgeous read, but I never expected any less.

Invasion by Luke Rhinehart

Earth is invaded by hairy beach balls, one of which happens to bounce onto self-confessed old geezer Billy Morton’s boat and follows him home. ‘Louie’ settles in fine, making friends with Billy’s family and generally being cute and fun. Until he starts using Billy’s computer to hack into the government.

I mostly enjoyed this book. It was funny and subversive and Billy was a wonderful character, but it did lose a bit of pace and the cliff-hanger ending was unexpected.

What were your favourite reads of May?