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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Yes, I know it’s November. The month is not the point.

ARCs. I have one due in November, three due in February 2020, and one that decided that winter was a lousy time for publication, packed up, and moved its release date to September 2020, which means it will be sitting on my TBR for a long time, gathering dust while the previous book slowly fades from my memory. It’s a rather shabby thing for a book do to, but what can a poor reviewer do?

Recently Published:

• Lethal Pursuit (Barker and Llewellyn #11) by Will Thomas
  Mystery
  Expected publication date, November 12, 2019, by Minotaur Books

When an English spy is killed a stone’s throw away from their offices, Cyrus Barker and Thomas Llewellyn are enlisted by Her Majesty’s Government to deliver a top-secret parcel- and to keep it out of Germany’s hands by any means necessary. But what could the parcel mean for Europe’s future, and just who are the strangely uniformed men trying to retrieve it? Barker and Llewellyn must uncover the mystery of the parcel and navigate the mysterious secret societies on London’s underworld before their enemies close in and silence them forever.

• The Twenty-Ninth Day by Alex Messenger
  Memoir
  Expected Publication date November 12, 2019, by Blackstone Publishing

Alex Messenger is no stranger to wilderness travel. The summer before his senior year of high school, the seventeen-year-old Messenger and four of his friends head to Nunavut in Northern Canada. There, they will spend forty-two days hiking and canoeing in some of the most remote wilderness areas in North American. But on the twenty-ninth day of the trip, Messenger is mauled by a Grizzly bear. Suddenly, their dream trip turns into a fight for survival as the group struggles to keep Messenger’s injuries from killing him as they make their way through the wilderness.

Upcoming Releases:

• Snow: A Scientific and Cultural Exploration by Giles Whittell. Science and Nature. Expected publication November 19, 2019, from Atria Books.

Whittell crosses centuries and continents to bring us extraordinary stories about snow, a substance many of us take for granted, but which is far more interesting and important than we might expect. Because who doesn’t want to read about snow on a snowy day?

Future Releases:

• Epic Solitude: A Story of Survival and a Quest for Meaning in the Far North by Katherine Keith.
  Memoir
  Expected publication February 4, 2020, from Blackstone Publishing

Katherine Keith had always longed for the wide-open spaces far from cities. She spent years wandering across the United States before finally settling in Alaska, where she fell in love, had a child, and built a home far from other people. The daily rhythms of survival brought her meaning, but also brought their own hardships. Long-distance dog sledding help bring Keith’s life into focus, and she decides to run the Iditarod, a race completed in near solitude.

• The Borgia Confessions by Alyssa Palombo
  Historical Fiction
  Expected publication February 11, 2020, from St. Martin’s Press

In the summer of 1492, Rodrigo Borgia has been elected Pope. He appoints his own son, Cesare, as a bishop, and his younger son Juan is named commander of the Papal Armies. Cesare chafes at his position, as he has dreamed of military glory and Juan proves an ineffective leader. Into the swirl of wealth, politics, and corruption comes a woman from the countryside, Maddalena Moretti, a servant who finds her life becoming more and more entwined with that of the infamous Borgia family.

• Master of Sorrows (The Silent Gods #1) by Justin T. Call
  Fantasy
  Expected publication date February 25, 2020, by Blackstone Publishing

Annev is a student at the Academy of Chaenbalu, a school where a select few are taught to find and retrieve magical artifacts to keep them safe and prevent them from being misused by those unable to resist the allure of dangerous magic. Annev wants to become an Avatar, a warrior-thief capable of breaking into the most heavily guarded fortresses to take the artifacts. But Annev carries a secret heritage of murder and dark magic, and when he is caught between his mentor’s philosophies and that of the masters of Chaenbalu, he must decide what his destiny is and what it could mean for the entire world.

• The Silvered Serpents (The Gilded Wolves #2) by Roshani Chokshi
  Fantasy
  Expected publication date September 22, 2020, by Wednesday Books

Severin and his friends have succeeded in thwarting the Fallen House, but the cost was higher than they could have imagined. Now they must pick up the pieces and push forward, for Severin has an agenda he is obsessed with and has set his sights on an artifact that grants its user god-like powers. The search takes them all to wintry Russia, where secrets come to light and force them to face themselves and discover new depths to themselves.

This is the book that packed up and moved its publication date to the second half of 2020. I have no idea why. I am hoping it doesn’t matter to the review copy I received, or else my review may be irrelevant. Perhaps I will contact Wednesday Books and make sure the eGalley I received in September will still be relevant to the book that will be published a year hence.

As of now, I have received a total of thirty ARCs since I opened my NetGalley account in 2018. I have reviewed twenty-five of the books for a feedback ration of 83%. Soon, I will post my review of Snow, and will have a ratio of 86%. I am quite proud of this ratio, and am glad that I have been picky about the books I request. It’s easy to start clicking on books and end up with far more books than you can hope to get to. So I suppose my advice for those who are new to NetGalley: be picky about what you choose. ARCs will multiply like Tribbles if you don’t keep an eye on them.