Luke Harkness, Author at Luke’s Blog

26Jul 2023 by Luke Harkness 3 Comments

The Best Books I’ve Read So Far This Year (2023)

I put out a poll on my Twitter the other day asking if people would be interested in reading an article about the book best books I’ve read so far this year. Please note that this article contains affiliate links. This means that if you choose to purchase any products via the links below, I may receive a small commission at no extra cost to you. These affiliate links do not affect my final opinion of the products. Obviously, with most of my followers being bookish folk and me offering them a free list of good books, most of them came back and overwhelmingly voted “f*ck yeah”. So then I had to go out and have a look at my StoryGraph and have a look at the books I’d rated…

22Jul 2023 by Luke Harkness No Comments

Before They Are Hanged by Joe Abercrombie book review

Book reviews, Fantasy

Joe Abercrombie is an author name that needs no introduction in the fantasy space. He’s a name that is often brought up as one of the best in the genre and most certainly the best at grim dark fantasy (where it’s all swearing, dark humour and gore etc). Before They Are Hanged is the second in the The First Law trilogy. I have read and enjoyed The First Blade which I enjoyed the characters of but said that the plot was slightly lacking. Does Before They Are Hanged improve upon this or is it much of the same? Please note that this article contains affiliate links. This means that if you choose to purchase any products via the links provided below, I may receive a small commission at no extra…

16Jul 2023 by Luke Harkness No Comments

Carrie Soto is Back by Taylor Jenkins Reid book review

Book reviews, Contemporary Fiction

I’ve read a few books by Taylor Jenkins Reid with my first being Malibu Rising which I thought was good but nothing amazing to then the incredible The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and Daisy Jones and the Six, two books that will forever be on my list of the best books I’ve ever read. Taylor Jenkins Reid (or TJR as I’m gonna refer to her so I don’t have to keep typing out her full name) specialises in writing books about lifetimes. They’re often stories of incredibly famous fictional people who have lived incredible lives to get to where they are today. Carrie Soto is Back is exactly the same. Please note that this article contains affiliate links. This means that if you choose to purchase any products via…

12Jul 2023 by Luke Harkness No Comments

93 Blog Post Ideas for Every Blog Niche

Features, Tips and Tricks

Did you think blogging was dying? Oh no. Blogging is still a very popular medium. According to OptinMonster, 409 million people view more than 20 billion pages every month with over 70 million posts being posted just on WordPress. Therefore that means there are most certainly going to be some people out there that would benefit from some ideas on what you can post to your blog. Blogging has become such a fascinating way for me not only to get across my opinions on all the books, but also a way for me to simply sit down and write about what I want, expressing my own thoughts, experiences or opinions in a blog post. This is what makes blogging so great and is often the reason so many people choose…

08Jul 2023 by Luke Harkness No Comments

The Top 5 Most Read Articles I Posted in June 2023

Features, Monthly Round Ups

Hi! Welcome to my website. Every month on here, I post a summary of the five most-read articles from the previous month in order from least read to most read. Please note that this article contains affiliate links. This means that if you choose to purchase any products via the links below, I may receive a small commission at no extra cost to you. These affiliate links do not affect my final opinion of the products. This serves a multitude of purposes: one is the give me a summary of the articles and genres of books that people want to read but it also gives other book bloggers a chance to see which posts do well and hopefully provide some ideas. Therefore, if you're a blogger then you may find…

06Jul 2023 by Luke Harkness No Comments

Is it worth jumping over to Meta’s Twitter rival Threads?

Features, Reactions, Recommendations, Tips and Tricks

I’ve been doing social media professionally for over half a decade now. I wouldn’t say I could make any account in the world go viral or even that I’m fully informed on every single element of social platforms. However, I have used social media both for work and also personally almost every single day for over a decade now. I’m always one of the first to try out new apps when they come along and am very keen to then compare them to whichever platform it is they’re trying to replicate (because being original isn’t cool anymore). Enter: Threads, an Instagram app. Threads was only released about 12 hours ago and I’ve had a good extensive look at it so I thought I would give my initial impressions from someone…

05Jul 2023 by Luke Harkness No Comments

Still Life by Sarah Winman book review

Book reviews, Historical Fiction

There are some books that receive an awful lot of praise and hype when you post about them on social media, Lessons In Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus was one and Still Life by Sarah Winman is another. This always then buries a high expectation into you whilst you’re reading it and, unfortunately, you often find that the book can never reach the hype that social media has set for it. Either it’s not your thing or the mass of audience who came to tell you it's great aren’t into the sort of books you like. Still Life isn’t one of those books. It’s brilliant. Please note that this article contains affiliate links. This means that if you choose to purchase any products via the links below, I may receive a…

04Jul 2023 by Luke Harkness No Comments

The Way It Is Now by Garry Disher book review

Book reviews, Crime

The Way It Is Now is a book that I was kindly sent by Viper Books as a proof copy quite a while ago. After showing my partner my TBR bookshelf which I’ve broken down into books sent to me to review and books I’ve bought - she chose this from the ‘books sent to me’ list. I had absolutely no idea of what the premise of the book would be when I picked it up and, after finishing it, I'm still not 100% confident of what the point of it was. Please note that this article contains affiliate links. This means if you choose to purchase any products using the links below, I may receive a small commission at no extra cost to you. These affiliate links do not…

03Jul 2023 by Luke Harkness 2 Comments

The 8 Books I Read in June 2023 and what I thought about them

Features, Monthly Round Ups

Being a book blogger (and a general fan of reading) I read a fair amount of books a month. Therefore, I like to write an article each month stating the books I’ve read so if you, like me, are a book blogger or a general fan of reading, you can pick up some reading ideas. Please note that this article contains affiliate links. This means that if you choose to purchase any products via the links below, I may receive a small commission at no extra cost to you. These affiliate links do not affect my final opinion of the products. In June, I managed to pack in eight books. I’m not sure how I had such a productive reading month and still manage to squeeze in three fantasy books…

30Jun 2023 by Luke Harkness No Comments

The Sanctuary by Andrew Hunter Murray book review

Book reviews, Mystery, Thriller

I saw that The Sanctuary was doing quite well in the 'best-seller' charts recently and so decided, after having kindly been sent it by Viper Books last year, that I'd pick up the early copy they'd sent across to me. The premise was an interesting one - it's about a man whose fiancé goes off to work on this project on an island with a billionaire and then decides to potentially call off their engagement because something on the island is telling her she should stay and focus on that. Therefore, he must go and find her and convince her to come back home with him. Please note that this article contains affiliate links. This means that if you choose to purchase any products via any of the links below,…

Author: Luke Harkness