Month: January 2021

ARC Review: You Have a Match

Posted January 4, 2021 / Book Reviews / 2 Comments
ARC Review: You Have a Match

I absolutely adored TWEET CUTE (and pestered my sister endlessly until she finally read it and loved it as much as me). I was a huge fan of the ship, the characters, the setting, and the unique plot. I compared YOU HAVE A MATCH a lot while reading it because it’s always hard to bring a sophomore novel to top the debut, which was a five-star read. Both books are kind of complicated, to be honest – there are so many different story threads to follow along with, yet it never feels like the author is taking on too much. YOU HAVE A MATCH follows Abby as she deals with the fallout from finding out that she has an older sister who was clearly adopted about a year and a half before she was born. How could her parents keep this kind of secret? What happened!? Savvy, her newfound sister, and Abby go to the same summer camp to get to know each other and try to determine how this all went down. Abby’s best-friend-turned-crush Leo is there working in the cafeteria, while Savvy is dealing with relationship drama of her own. I loved learning about Abby’s friendship with Connie and Leo, while also seeing her sisterhood/friendship develop with Savvy (after some very rocky patches and fights at the start!).The camp setting was a lot of fun and led to some great moments with Abby’s photography. I loved that she was exploring different options instead of college, or considered community college […]

2020 End of Year Wrap-Up and Stats

Posted January 3, 2021 / Uncategorized / 10 Comments
2020 End of Year Wrap-Up and Stats

100 Books Read This year sucked. Period. It’s the “worst” reading year I’ve had in a while. I reduced my goal from 120 to 100 books – no regrets – and still had to include cookbooks and other shorter books to meet it. I can’t figure out why my reading spreadsheet is telling me I read 102 books when I definitely didn’t, so enjoy these mostly-accurate charts and reading summaries from this garbage year. Books Read As usual, I read mostly contemporary this year. Just over 50% – not bad! I try to aim for under 50% but why not read what I love? I also include this as a very broad category, including romance. I’m also not surprised to see that mystery/thriller is next. I’ve been really trying to read more of those. Nonfiction is up a lot because I counted a ton of cookbooks 😉 I have to admit that I read a lot of egalleys. I request a bunch of books and frankly do a decent job of actually reading them. I’m not surprised that the mixed format category is a close second. Even if I read only a few chapters via audio, I still count it as a mix. This one isn’t labeled – whoops – but 73% of my books were digital. I just prefer to read on my Kindle than bring around a physical copy, especially because I do a lot of reading in bed when the lights are out. Most contemporary books fall […]

Bookmark Lit Bulletin | December 2020

Posted January 2, 2021 / Bookmark Lit Bulletin, Features, Wrap-Ups / 2 Comments
Bookmark Lit Bulletin | December 2020

  The Bookmark Lit Bulletin wraps up the last month in reading and what was on the blog, as well as what’s coming up next. You can check out my book haul, books read, posts shared, challenge updates, etc. You can read past bulletins here. If you’re looking for more personal updates, you can check out my Lauren Lately feature; it highlights my life events and non-bookish fun from the previous 30 days. I pulled it off! I managed to read enough books to meet my (lowered) reading challenge of 100 books. I definitely read some short books, novellas, and cookbooks to make it happen, but I’m proud of myself. I read all of the Christmas books I was hoping to get to except for one!      17 books read in December 17 new books  •  0 rereads  •  0 DNF Pages read: 5270 •   Average rating:  3.8 stars Sources: 9 purchased, 5 review, 1 gifted, 1 borrowed, 1 BOTM Formats: 6 mixed format, 5 hardcover, 3 egalley, 2 paperback, 1 ebook Genres: 9 contemporary, 5 nonfiction, 2 mystery/thriller, 1 fantasy Age Target: 14 adult, 3 young adult Check out my 2020 challenge sign-up post for more details, goals, etc.! Popsugar Reading Challenge 0 read this month | 35/40 read total None this month Monthly Key Word Challenge 1 this month: crown Calendar of Crime Challenge Primary action takes place in the month Romanceopoly 0 read this month | 2 read total  Rolls: N/A Rainbow Try a Chapter Unhaul This month’s color: Red Yeah, what are reading challenges anymore? […]

Review Round Up | Chasing Lucky, The Hunting Party, and How the King of Elfhame Learned to Hate Stories

Posted January 1, 2021 / Book Reviews, Review Roundup / 0 Comments
Review Round Up | Chasing Lucky, The Hunting Party, and How the King of Elfhame Learned to Hate Stories

In an effort to cut down on posts and burnout, my Review Roundups will feature 2-4 books I’ve read or listened to recently. Sometimes they’re newer releases and sometimes they’re all backlist titles. My ARC reviews usually get the solo treatment. Enjoy the mini reviews! I’ve pretty much loved all of Jenn Bennett’s books and this one was good! I have to say it might be my least favorite, but still a very cute, atmospheric read. Annoyingly, I can’t really put my finger on the things that bother me or prevent it from being a fave. Josie returns home to Beauty, RI (kind of like Newport, in my eyes) and encounters her long lost best friend, Lucky, after they were essentially ripped apart five years before. Josie and the women in her family are “cursed” and have bad luck with men. This didn’t really play into the story as much as I expected but was somewhat of an underlying theme. She and her mom are back in Beauty to run her grandma’s bookstore while she’s away with her aunt. It was fun to read about this coastal Rhode Island town but I didn’t get as many fun New England seaport vibes as I was hoping for? The bookstore was THERE but not as present as I would have liked either for some reason. There are a lot of plot points I didn’t expect or remember from the synopsis, if they were in there, like the breaking of a store window and a […]