Stacking the Shelves {6} & My Reading Pile {10}

Stacking the Shelves is a weekly feature hosted by Tynga's Reviews, so as I am sharing what was in my mailbox this week, I am giving a big shout out to her.

Wow! Has it really been three weeks already since my last STS post? I can't believe it.

First of, I have to mention an amazing book I forgot to talk about during my last Stacking the Shelves post. I'm not sure how many of you participated in the #CleanUpTBRPile Read-a-thon that the wonderful Valerie from Stuck In Books hosted a while back. It was such an amazing event, and Valerie did an amazing job with it. During one of the twitter parties I actually ended up winning a prize which I was allowed to pick myself. There were quite a few winners before me, so I had to keep my fingers crossed that the book I really wanted would still be available by the time it was my turn to choose.

Well, I got lucky and it was, in fact, still available, so my choice was

Exiled by M.R. Merrick!!! The author himself send me a Kindle copy of it and I cannot wait to get started. Now, I'm just waiting to finally get my Kindle, but it will come. So, yes, I am super, super excited for this book! Thank you so, so much to both Valerie and M.R. Merrick! You guys rock!

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I received four books in the last three weeks and each and every one of them is fantastic!

If you've read my last STS post, you probably know how devastated I was about having to bring Veronica Roth's Insurgent back to the library before finishing it. Well, lo and behold, two days after I returned it, this beautiful, beautiful ARC showed up at my front door.

I won it a few months ago, but there were some shipping issues, so it took a little bit longer. But it was sooo worth the wait! I read it right away and it was absolutely fantastic. Though, I haven't decided yet whether I like this one more than Divergent or not. At the moment, I'm leaning more towards Divergent being my favorite, to be honest.

Thank you so much to the lovely Harmony of Radiant Reads!!!

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The next two books I won during ArmchairBEA. The amazing Cindy from Cindy's Love Of Books was offering a Gift Card and I was the lucky one who won it. With it, I picked these two fabulous books.

I had a really tough time deciding which books to pick. Well, that's actually only half true, because I always knew I would pick Rachel Vincent's Shadow Bound, mainly so I would finally get off my butt and read Blood Bound which has been collecting dust on my shelves for way too long. There are three books I have to finish first, but after that I'm going to make a list and both, Blood Bound and Shadow Bound, will be very close to the top.

Now, I had real trouble picking the second book because there are so many I really want to read. At the end, it came down to If I Stay by Gayle Forman and Grave Mercy by Robin LaFevers.

My dear friend Alba (from BookPics) urged me to get If I Stay. She absolutely loves the book and the author; and after some research at my local library, I discovered they were purchasing Grave Mercy. Just like that, the decision was kind of made for me, both by the library and Alba. I know I'll have to have lots of tissues handy when reading this, so I'm going to wait until I'm in the mood for a real good cry to read this one.

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 The last book is a book that got sent to me directly from the author.

It's called Die Klingen der Rose (Jenseits des Horizonts) by Zoe Archer, which is the German version of her book Warrior (The Blades of the Rose #1). She also included some really neat swag. I especially love the pen, I've been writing everything with it ever since I got it. Yes, I admit, I'm a sucker for swag. *lol*

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Now, off to topic number two...

My Reading Pile {10}

The fabulous fiktshun came up with this wonderful idea to share the books you are planning on reading each week. So, as I am sharing my picks with you, I am giving credit her.

I have two books on my pile this week.

The first one is Water For Elephants by Sara Gruen. It is the book club read for July and since our next meeting is on Tuesday, I better get at it. So far, I have only read the first couple of pages, but I am liking it already. I can't wait explore this new world some more.

The second book is a book I received for review - House of Shadows by Rachel Neumeier. I have read the first chapter already and it's a little bit difficult to keep up because there are so many strange names, but I am hoping the more I get into the story, the easier it will get to tell who is who.

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You know what I will be reading this week, so it's your turn to tell me. I would love to hear from you!

Have a wonderful reading week!!!