01 Apr 2024 Entertainment Comment

Everything I Read This Month: March 2024

Everything I Read in March 2024

March felt like an exceptionally long month, especially when I went back over my Storygraph reading log to prepare this post. It feels like months since I read — and adored! — Swift and Saddled by Lyla Sage, which came out earlier in March. This book really set the stage for a lot of my March reading, since I went on to enjoy a handful of books with similar tropes and genres, including a few of Elsie Silver’s Chestnut Springs books and the upcoming Wild About You by Kaitlyn Hill. This is also the first month I really dove into my Kindle Unlimited membership (more on that here), which only makes me more confident that the subscription is worth it for me!

Of the fourteen books I read this month, here are my top five favorites:

Table of Contents

P.S. to track my reading, I started using the StoryGraph website and app. This reading tracker is really cool and gives you all kinds of interesting stats about your reading style. Plus, the app gives great recommendations based on books you’ve previously read and loved. Check out everything I’m currently reading and add me on the app here!

March 2024 In Books

Swift and Saddled by Lyla Sage (Rebel Blue Ranch Book #2)

5/5 Stars

After absolutely loving Done and Dusted (read my review here), the first book in Lyla Sage’s Rebel Blue Ranch series, I had high hopes for Swift and Saddled. Unsurprisingly, this book met and even surpassed my expectations! A sweet, quick read, this cowboy romance novel features a strong female main character and a thoughtful love interest with healthy relationship expectations.

Like with Done and Dusted, Lyla Sage touches on topics of mental health here, focusing mostly on depression (whereas book one featured a main character with ADHD). I just love Lyla Sage’s writing style, and it has been so fun to see how much bookstagram has loved this series — makes me even more excited for book three in the series (and a tv series!? What!? So exciting!!).

Swift and Saddled by Lyla Sage is available from Amazon here.

Wild About You by Kaitlyn Hill

4/5 Stars

Kaitlyn Hill’s Wild About You is a sweet YA opposites-attract novel featuring a strong female protagonist with a new anxiety diagnosis. That’s not the crux of the story, but it’s what stuck out the most to me, as a reader with anxiety. Natalie, the main character, joins the cast of an adventure reality tv series in hopes of winning money to pay for school. She is paired up with a grumpy know-it-all, Finn, who is dealing with his own trauma. Chaos and comedy ensue. This book is a quick, enjoyable read, with some hilarious banter throughout.

Wild About You by Kaitlyn Hill is available from Amazon here.

The Veiled Kingdom by Holly Renee (The Veiled Kingdom Book #1)

4/5 Stars

Holly Renee sure knows how to write fantasy, and her newest foray into the genre is no exception. A great option for fans of SJM’s Throne of Glass series or Sarah A. Parker’s When the Moon Hatched (read my review here), The Veiled Kingdom by Holly Renee is a great start to what is sure to be a robust fantasy romance series. In short, this opening book does a great job setting the stage for the new series. Featuring a strong enemies to lovers storyline with a serious helping of spice, this book kept my attention from start to finish — and I read it in one day!

The Veiled Kingdom by Holly Renee is available from Amazon here.

Where Good Girls Go to Die by Holly Renee (Good Girls Book #1)

4/5 Stars

This was my first non-fantasy read from Holly Renee, and I was really impressed with the emotionality of the story here. Where the author does a great job world building in her fantasy series, I now think it is to the detriment of the character’s emotional development (that’s not to say that the fantasy books aren’t enjoyable or well drafted, just different). This book started out with a dramatic (and dark) opening, but quickly turns into a more traditional romance.

Where Good Girls Go to Die by Holly Renee is available from Amazon here.

Flawless by Elsie Silver (Chestnut Springs Book #1)

5/5 Stars

I blame Lyla Sage for piquing my interest in this genre, but Elsie Silver’s Chestnut Springs books have firmly planted me in my cowboy romance era. I downloaded Flawless on Kindle Unlimited after a friend recommended it and I could not put it down. An opposites-attract kind of romance, Flawless features a big city lawyer put in charge of all-but-babysitting a client with a PR image problem. Forced proximity ensues and you can guess what happens from there. This is book one of a five part series, so better get started!

Flawless by Elsie Silver is available from Amazon here.

Heartless by Elsie Silver (Chestnut Springs Book #2)

4/5 Stars

Picking up roughly where Flawless left off, Heartless is the story of the second Eaton brother, a grumpy single dad who takes on more responsibility than is his due. This story features a big age gap in the featured romance, but otherwise is an opposites-attract/grumpy-sunshine love story with a funny, strong-willed female protagonist. Flawless was my favorite of the Chestnut Springs books so far, but this one was great, too.

Heartless by Elsie Silver is available from Amazon here.

Majesty by Katharine McGee (American Royals Book #2)

5/5 Stars

After loving the start of the American Royals series, I found that Majesty delved deeper into the themes — and conflicts — set up in book one. Here, Beatrice has to navigate her new power as queen, despite not everyone being quite on board for a young woman ruling alone. History lovers will enjoy subtle nods to the struggles women rulers in history have had to deal with. The series should have ended here.

Majesty by Katharine McGee is available from Amazon here.

P.S. You can find my review of book one in this series in my January reading journal here!

Rivals by Katharine McGee (American Royals Book #3)

4/5 Stars

After two strong books, this is where the American Royals series began to go off the rails for me. Obviously, this is a fictional story, but my suspension of disbelief can only go so far, apparently. While the whole series is obviously YA, this book (and book four below) felt very juvenile. In this book, Beatrice goes to the League of Kings conference and basically joins the Plastics. The other characters in the series aren’t much better.

Rivals by Katharine McGee is available from Amazon here.

Reign by Katharine McGee (American Royals Book #4)

2/5 Stars

I almost DNF’ed this book a few separate times. I could get past the queen’s amnesia or Samantha running away to live a normal life, but it pretty much lost me when Daphne coerced Prince Jeff into an engagement because she “thought” she was pregnant. As I mentioned above, obviously the story is fictional, but I could not, as a reader, accept that no one in the monarchy here would insist on a pregnancy test. Like to the point of Daphne being in a doctor’s office, getting a sonogram, but no pregnancy test!? It was too much, and it just went downhill from there.

Reign by Katharine McGee is available from Amazon here.

The Things We Left Behind by Lucy Score (Knockemout Book #3)

5/5 Stars

A strong conclusion to Lucy Score’s Knockemout series, The Things We Left Behind follows sunshiny Sloan and brooding Lucian. Both characters are pretty well-known by this point in the series, so it is fun to see how Lucy Score fleshes out their backstory and ultimate romance. This book is a bit more unrealistic than the first two in the series (not that any are particularly down-to-earth), and there are parts of Lucien’s character that would be just a bit concerning if this was a real-life romance, but once you set that aside, it’s a pretty fun read.

The Things We Left Behind by Lucy Score is available from Amazon here.

P.S. I reviewed the first two books in this series in my February reading journal here!

Twisted Love by Ana Huang (Twisted Book #1)

5/5 Stars

With a lot of similarities to The Things We Left Behind by Lucy Score, Twisted Love by Ana Huang features a sunshiny female main character who falls for a dark and politically powerful love interest. Again, if this were real life, there would definitely be some questionable power dynamics in the relationship, but Ana Huang’s writing pulls you in to the point that you can overlook a lot of flaws.

Twisted Love by Ana Huang is available from Amazon here.

Haunting Adeline & Hunting Adeline by H.D. Carlton (Cat & Mouse Duet)

3/5 Stars

I had seen a lot about this dark romance series on IG and TikTok. When I saw it was included in my Kindle Unlimited subscription, I decided to give it a shot. Both books in this series, along with the related Where’s Molly, come with a whole slew of trigger warnings and content warnings. Somehow, though, before I started the books, I thought the warnings and “dark romance” descriptor might have been overdone, exaggerating what was to come in the books. TLDR – the warnings were not exaggerated, these books are very, very dark.

I’m giving both Haunting Adeline and Hunting Adeline 3/5 stars each because the story definitely pulled me in. The romance storyline is incredibly problematic at times, with an emphasis on stalking and violence in the “relationship” from the start. If you overlook the not-super-consensual beginnings of the relationship between Adeline and Zade in book one, then their relationship in book two seems more robust, but that might just be because everything else that is going on is even darker and more twisted than Zade stalking Adeline and coercing her into a relationship. Regardless, the books kept me hooked to the end with different twists and turns that left me wanting to know what happened.

If you have any concerns about content matter or triggers, you may want to just give these a pass.

The Cat & Mouse Duet by H.D. Carlton is available from Amazon here.

Where’s Molly by H.D. Carlton

3/5 Stars

A shorter spinoff from the Cat & Mouse Duet above, Where’s Molly tells the story of a side character we never actually meet in Hunting Adeline. Again, do not discredit the trigger warnings and content warnings on this one. It’s a pretty quick read, pulling in some of the characters and story of the Cat & Mouse Duet but largely standing alone.

Again, if you have any concerns about content matter or triggers, you may want to just give this on a pass, too.

Where’s Molly by H.D. Carlton is available from Amazon here.

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What have you been reading lately?
Share your favorites in the comments so I can add them to my TBR pile!

Everything I Read in March 2024

Still searching for your next favorite read?
Check out February reading journal for more great titles for your TBR!


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*Some of the novels featured here were gifted to me as part of various book review programs that Cats & Coffee is a part of. I was not required to post about the novel in exchange for getting a copy to read. All thoughts and opinions are my honest own.