Happy Friday bookish friends and welcome to damppebbles. If you’ve been following the blog over the Summer, you may have noticed that I’ve been participating in the 20 Books of Summer Challenge run and organised by the lovely Cathy at 746 Books. The challenge invites bookish types to select twenty (or fifteen, or ten) books which they plan to read and review within the challenge window, that being between 1st June and 1st September. Well, it was 1st September yesterday, so I wanted to go out with a bang and write a wrap up post because the rest of the challenge has been a bit of a lacklustre fizzle for me this year. Pfffttt 😂 Before I proceed any further though I would like to take this opportunity to remind everyone that I did complete the challenge back in 2020, in lockdown, when we were more focussed on staying in than going out and I had a lot more time on my hands. I have done it, I can do it again! Was I perhaps a little too ambitious this year? Yes, yes I was 😬

My original list looked like this:

The Trial by S.R. Masters (One More Chapter)
Black Mouth by Ronald Malfi (Titan Books)
A Sliver of Darkness by C.J. Tudor (Penguin Michael Joseph)
True Crime Story by Joseph Knox (Penguin Books)
Follow Me to the Edge by Tariq Ashkanani (Thomas & Mercer)
What Lies Between Us by John Marrs (Thomas & Mercer)
The Watchers by A.M. Shine (Aries)
Eight Detectives by Alex Pavesi (Penguin Books)
Black Widows by Cate Quinn (Orion)
Tall Oaks by Chris Whitaker (Bonnier Zaffre)
No Country for Girls by Emma Styles (Sphere)
The It Girl by Ruth Ware (Simon & Schuster)
The Last Party by Clare Mackintosh (Sphere)
Then She Vanishes by Claire Douglas (Penguin Books)
The Sound of Her Voice by Nathan Blackwell (Orion)
The Collective by Alison Gaylin (Orion)
Hunting Evil by Chris Carter (Simon & Schuster)
The Jigsaw Man by Nadine Matheson (HQ)
Until the Debt is Paid by Alexander Hartung translated by Steve Anderson (Amazon Crossing)
Damage by Caitlin Wahrer (Penguin Books)

Of these I have read FOURTEEN ✅ which is hugely disappointing as I was determined to read all twenty. I feel as though I was so close…..yet so annoyingly far away from hitting my target!

✅ The Trial by S.R. Masters (One More Chapter)
✅ Black Mouth by Ronald Malfi (Titan Books)
✅ A Sliver of Darkness by C.J. Tudor (Penguin Michael Joseph)
✅ True Crime Story by Joseph Knox (Penguin Books)
✅ Follow Me to the Edge by Tariq Ashkanani (Thomas & Mercer)
✅ What Lies Between Us by John Marrs (Thomas & Mercer)
✅ The Watchers by A.M. Shine (Aries)
✅ Eight Detectives by Alex Pavesi (Penguin Books)
Black Widows by Cate Quinn (Orion)
Tall Oaks by Chris Whitaker (Bonnier Zaffre)
✅ No Country for Girls by Emma Styles (Sphere)
✅ The It Girl by Ruth Ware (Simon & Schuster)
✅ The Last Party by Clare Mackintosh (Sphere)
Then She Vanishes by Claire Douglas (Penguin Books)
✅ The Sound of Her Voice by Nathan Blackwell (Orion)
✅ The Collective by Alison Gaylin (Orion)
Hunting Evil by Chris Carter (Simon & Schuster)
The Jigsaw Man by Nadine Matheson (HQ)
✅ Until the Debt is Paid by Alexander Hartung translated by Steve Anderson (Amazon Crossing)
Damage by Caitlin Wahrer (Penguin Books)

And of these fourteen I have reviewed TEN books within the challenge window of 1st June to 1st September.

➡️ The Trial by S.R. Masters (One More Chapter)
➡️ Black Mouth by Ronald Malfi (Titan Books)
A Sliver of Darkness by C.J. Tudor (Penguin Michael Joseph)
True Crime Story by Joseph Knox (Penguin Books)
➡️ Follow Me to the Edge by Tariq Ashkanani (Thomas & Mercer)
What Lies Between Us by John Marrs (Thomas & Mercer)
➡️ The Watchers by A.M. Shine (Aries)
➡️ Eight Detectives by Alex Pavesi (Penguin Books)
Black Widows by Cate Quinn (Orion)
Tall Oaks by Chris Whitaker (Bonnier Zaffre)
➡️ No Country for Girls by Emma Styles (Sphere)
➡️ The It Girl by Ruth Ware (Simon & Schuster)
➡️ The Last Party by Clare Mackintosh (Sphere)
Then She Vanishes by Claire Douglas (Penguin Books)
➡️ The Sound of Her Voice by Nathan Blackwell (Orion)
➡️ The Collective by Alison Gaylin (Orion)
Hunting Evil by Chris Carter (Simon & Schuster)
The Jigsaw Man by Nadine Matheson (HQ)
Until the Debt is Paid by Alexander Hartung translated by Steve Anderson (Amazon Crossing)
Damage by Caitlin Wahrer (Penguin Books)

However, being the rebellious rule breaker that I am (😂) I will be reviewing the four books I haven’t yet reviewed on the blog under the #20booksofsummer22 hashtag in the coming months. So please look out for my review of What Lies Between Us by John Marrs on or around 22nd September, my review of Until the Debt is Paid by Alexander Hartung translated by Steve Anderson on or around 26th September, my review of A Sliver of Darkness by C.J. Tudor on 29th September and my review of True Crime Story by Joseph Knox on or around 6th October. What a rebel! And should my reading schedule allow me to choose a book from my shelves then I will be selecting from the remaining SIX books on my list because I really, REALLY need to read these beauties:

2⃣ Tall Oaks by Chris Whitaker (Bonnier Zaffre)
3⃣ Then She Vanishes by Claire Douglas (Penguin Books)
4⃣ Hunting Evil by Chris Carter (Simon & Schuster)
5⃣ The Jigsaw Man by Nadine Matheson (HQ)
6⃣ Damage by Caitlin Wahrer (Penguin Books)

So there we have it. I didn’t quite manage to read all of the twenty books I selected for the challenge but I did finish twenty-four books in total and started a twenty-fifth on 30th August so that’s got to count for something…??! Here are the other books I read between 1st June and 1st September which weren’t on my list but perhaps should have been…? 😜

📚 Fatal Witness by Robert Bryndza
📚 More Than You’ll Ever Know by Katie Gutierrez
📚 Summer Fever by Kate Riordan
📚 Run Time by Catherine Ryan Howard
📚 The Family Retreat by Bev Thomas
📚 Everyone In My Family Has Killed Someone by Benjamin Stevenson
📚 The Invisible by Peter Papathanasiou (review will go live on 5th September)
📚 Black Lake Manor by Guy Morpuss (review will go live on 8th September)
📚 The Way It Is Now by Garry Disher (review will go live on 12th September)
📚 The Axe Woman by Håkan Nesser translated by Sarah Death (review will go live on 15th September)

Despite feeling that I was always trying to catch up I have really enjoyed taking part in the challenge this year (although my poor family who had to put up with my constant fretting about not meeting the target would probably disagree with that statement!). Anyhoo, that’s it for another year. Fingers crossed Cathy runs the challenge again in 2023 as I hope to redeem myself and absolutely smash it 💥

And if my future self is reading this, stick to the darned list, Emma! Read the books you choose and don’t accept any new review requests. They may be pretty, and you may be desperate to read them, but they won’t help you complete the challenge. Rant over 🤣

Did you take part in the 20 Books of Summer challenge this year? How did you fare? Let me know in the comments.