slowest reading month this year, i think. at least in terms of books. i only read three books in july, but to my offence, i was reading a dance with dragons by george rr martin, and that is one hell of a long book.

• Mechanique- A Tale of the Circus Tresaulti by Genevieve Valentine. definitely one of the best books i've read all year. it was just so different from everything else i've ever read, and that was such a huge refreshment! also, what an amazing debut book. looking forward to reading much more of Valentine's in the future.
• Smut by Alan Bennett. i bought this book on a whim at the airport getting home from the roskilde festival. partly because of the cover and partly because the back cover text. it was about sex and i hadn't read anything sexy in a while. this books is comprised of two parts, two stories. both stories were absurd, ridiculous and oh so funny.
• A Dance With Dragons by George RR Martin. i've been waiting for this book for about a year and even though i was having a hard time getting into a song of ice and fire in the beginning, watching the book come to life on HBO's show A Game of Thrones, i was looking very much forward to reading about the world in Westeros, on the Wall, in Mereen and everywhere else. there were some characters in the last book who weren't given any screen time, but who Martin promised us we would see this time around. i must say however, the book disappointed me a bit. i loved the chapters (however few they were) with Arya in it and Theon and Victarion and Asha. but there were too many god damn long chapters with characters talking about things that had happened in previous chapters, yeah, like we didn't already know? daenerys is still one of my favorite characters, but she's still spending too much time on the other side of the narrow sea and it seems kind of... i don't know, a neverending thing for her to never get back to Westoros and claim the Iron Throne. still, this book had some cool surprises and twists, but did it move forward? an inch? i don't know. probably a ton of things i missed on my first read-through, but what's the internet for, right?

today i started neil gaiman's novel american gods and so far it's kind of cool with a sort of 'Supernatural' feel to it. i like that.