State of the ARC is a meme hosted by Avalinah’s Books in which we round up our ARCs and attempt to wrangle them into something approaching order. Sometimes it’s like herding cats.

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I’ve been meaning to write this all week, but the days kept passing without my being able to get All The Things done. Would someone kindly slow things down so I get can everything done?

Anyway.

I currently have five books on my NetGalley shelf, ranging from fantasy to mystery to a survival memoir. They all look fantastic, and I’m going to have to read a few of them in August, since they are being published in September, and I will be out of the country for a week during September.

Currently, my feedback ratio is 79%. Not bad, but they took away my 80% badge. Alas! Oh, well. I’ll get that corrected as soon as I submit my review for Ann Cleeves’s The Long Call. Or, I could find a “Read Now” title and push my ratio back over 80%. As of now, I have 24 approvals, with 19 titles reviewed.

What’s on my NetGalley To Read shelf?

The Long Call (Two Rivers #1)
by Ann Cleeves
Mystery
384 pages
Expected publication date: September 3, 2019, from St. Martin’s Press

In North Devon, where two rivers meet and flow into the sea, Detective Matthew Venn waits outside the church where his estranged father’s funeral is happening. As he walks away, he receives a call: A body has been found. A man with an albatross tattoo was stabbed to death. As he investigates the murder, Matthew’s past collides with the new life he has built for himself.

The Ten Thousand Doors of January
by Alix E. Harrow
Fantasy
384 pages
Expected publication date: September 10, 2019, by Redhook Books

At the turn of the Twentieth-century, young January Sculler lives with her guardian in a sprawling mansion filled with peculiar treasures. Then she finds a wondrous book that smells of other worlds and tells a fantastical tale of love and adventure that opens January’s mind to a world greater than anything she had imagined.

A Hero Born (Legend of the Condor Heroes #1)
by Jin Yong, translated from the Chinese by
Fantasy
416 pages
Expected publication date: September 17, 2019, by St. Martin’s Press

A Hero Born is classic Chinese fantasy now available in English for the first time. After the death of his father, Guo Jing and his mother flee to the court of Genghis Khan. Guo Jing intends to learn everything he can from the warlord, but unbeknownst to him, he is destined to face an opponent who will challenge him in every way possible.

The Adventure of the Peculiar Protocols
by Nicholas Meyer
Mystery
256 pages
Expected publication date: October 15, 2019, by St. Martin’s Press

In January 1905, Holmes and Watson are summoned to investigate the death of an agent of the British Secret Service who was found floating in the Thames. The agent was carrying a manuscript detailing clandestine plans by a secret society to take over the world. Now, in the company of a bewitching woman, Holmes and Watson travel across Europe from Paris to Tsarist Russia, with mysterious men dogging their heels. Along the way, they uncover a vast conspiracy that will test Holmes to his limits.

The Twenty-Ninth Day: Surviving a Grizzly Attack in the Canadian Tundra
by Alex Messenger
Survival/Memoir
272 pages
Expected publication date: November 12, 2019, by Blackstone Publishing

A weeks-long canoe trip in the northern Canadian wilderness is the trip of a lifetime for seventeen-year-old Alex and his friends, but after he is attacked by a Grizzly bear on the twenty-ninth day of the trip, their dream turns into a nightmarish struggle for survival as they draw on every bit of wilderness knowledge and ingenuity as they struggle toward the nearest village.

Recently Published:

Gods of Jade and Shadow
by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
Fantasy
352 pages
Published July 23, 2019, by Del Rey

Casiopea Tun and her mother live in Casiopea’s grandfather’s sprawling home in Yucatan, but they are treated as little more than servants by the rest of the family. One day, Casiopea opens a long-locked trunk in her grandfather’s bedroom and discovers a pile of bones. The bones belong to the Mayan god of the underworld, and before she knows it Casiopea is swept up into a strange adventure to reclaim the god’s missing body parts before he becomes human– and before Casiopea dies. This story is based upon Mayan folklore, and its fairytale-like prose looks simpler than it is. Moreno-Garcia paints a vivid portrait of a young woman’s search for happiness.