After a rather successful Readathon, and a so far successful four and a bit months of reading (oh my, are we in May already?!) I am more obsessed with books than ever.

Which is unfortunate, as I have very little time at the moment in which to read. I have an amazing pile of books which I stocked up on due to recommendations on Goodreads, from Book Riot and from Waterstones, but as I am currently training to be a teacher, my studies have had to take priority.

This was made painfully clear to me this week, when a much anticipated book arrived in the post.

The Wrath and the Dawn

I preordered The Wrath and the Dawn by Renee Ahdieh, after seeing a blog post about it and being captivated by the gorgeous cover and intriguing description.

Just check this out, from Goodreads:

A sumptuous and epically told love story inspired by A Thousand and One Nights

Every dawn brings horror to a different family in a land ruled by a killer. Khalid, the eighteen-year-old Caliph of Khorasan, takes a new bride each night only to have her executed at sunrise. So it is a suspicious surprise when sixteen-year-old Shahrzad volunteers to marry Khalid. But she does so with a clever plan to stay alive and exact revenge on the Caliph for the murder of her best friend and countless other girls. Shazi’s wit and will, indeed, get her through to the dawn that no others have seen, but with a catch . . . she’s falling in love with the very boy who killed her dearest friend.

She discovers that the murderous boy-king is not all that he seems and neither are the deaths of so many girls. Shazi is determined to uncover the reason for the murders and to break the cycle once and for all.

Amazing, right? So I got straight online and ordered the stunning hardback US edition and it arrived 2 days ago, looking more beautiful than expected. The bookplates are divine and the edging of the pages is rustic and adds to the classic, old Arabian tales theme. I cracked open the pages, and began to read… then had to promptly stop myself after 6 or seven pages as I was already getting sucked in, and I had lesson planning to do for the next day.

So this book is sitting on my bedside table, taunting me each night as I go to bed, weary from marking and planning. Even this weekend, I have been unable to devote myself to the book, as I have a Masters study to complete and submit by the close of Sunday.

There is a glimmer of hope though.

My course will be ending in just 5 weeks time. And a half-term holiday is but a week away. Surely I can spend a day of that holiday free of marking and planning, and just dive into the world that Ahdieh has created?

And when Summer comes around, I have a huge collection of books that have been crying out my name for far too long…