Hey guys! I’m still alive and unsurprisingly still reading a book at my usual slow-poke pace. My current read is Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy after many recommendations from my friends and the last page I bookmarked was at Part 4 of the story. LET ME JUST SAY… The way I’m reacting to the characters and the overall story going on aren’t something I expected. I thought it would be a chill read (despite the mammoth 900+ pages compacted in such a small book), but I have a serious beef with the main protagonist Levin, and I’ll tell you all about it later in this post.

Today, I want to list out the book goodies I’ve picked up since March (much to my husband’s numerous intense side-eyes and horror), that also make them automatically my TBR for the year. My “hunting grounds” for these books are mostly Tsutaya Bookstore at Pavilion Bukit Jalil, Eslite Bookstore at Bukit Bintang, MPH Bookstore at TRX, and just recently, Kinokuniya at KLCC.

My Books!

Funny Story by Emily Henry

Children of Paradise: The Struggle for the Soul of Iran by Laura Secor

Agnes Grey by Anna Brontë

Blood Over Bright Haven by M.L. Wang

There are Rivers in the Sky by Elif Shafak

Witchcraft for Wayward Girls by Grady Hendrix

Love on the Brain by Ali Hazelwood

The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins

The Emperor of Gladness by Ocean Vuong

The Edge of Innocence by Edith Wharton

Masters of Death by Olivia Blake

Happy Place by Emily Henry

An Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir

Spark of the Everflame by Penn Cole

The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James

The Shadow of Gods by John Gwynne

Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Fire by Kristin Cashore

The Black Witch by Laurie Forest

Shatter Me by Tahereh Mafi

Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Currently reading

Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy

Okay, where do I start with Anna Karenina? I might have to do a separate dedicated review for this book if I want to go in-depth. Without giving away the spoilers, this story is and not exclusively about the beautiful Anna Karenina, a sophisticated woman living in 19th century Russia who forms an affair outside of her marriage with uptight and reserved Karenin for a dashing young man called Count Vronsky. She abandons all emotions and commitment for her marriage that she feels is empty and lacks passion and love. It is a relationship that is destined to doom is what I know (still not a spoiler) but I haven’t reached the part where they start to spiral out of control.

The story follows several main characters; Anna Arkadyevna Karenina, Count Alexei Kirillovich Vronsky (lover), Alexei Alexandrovich Karenin (husband), Konstantin Dmitrich Levin (supposed to represent Tolstoy), Princess Ekaterina (Kitty, Levin’s big crush), Stepan Arkadyevitch Oblonsky, and Princess Darya (Dolly). It deals with themes such as love and betrayal, faith, family, marriage, Imperial Russian society, rural and country life, what it means to be Russian, and many other Russian economic and political issues of the time.