Month: March 2023

April TBR

Posted March 31, 2023 / Book Lists, Features, TBR Lists / 0 Comments

My monthly TBR feature here shows my progress based on last month’s TBR, my plans for this month, and anything else I might be thinking about from a reading perspective. Sometimes I feature a little poll at the bottom so you guys can help me figure out a certain title I should read from a group of books. April TBR March was my best month of the year and I was already off to a great start. I kept hoping I could crack 10 books in a month since I’ve read 9 each of the previous! I’m excited because I hope to read a few fantasy and/or dense books this year and it’s lovely to have a cushion and be ahead of my challenge to do so. I have a few readathons scheduled for this month so there’s a good chance April will also be a big month of reading! Readathon Books I’ve been really looking for some fun readathons lately and I always discover them one or two days too late! I managed to stumble into a few for the end of March into April so I thought I would share them here. (I’ll be reading a couple of books for Lala-thon as a channel member but that goes from March 29-31.) Flowerathon (April 7-9): I saw Rachel from Happy Go Lovely Sleeves is hosting a readathon where you read books with flowers on the cover… very easy for me 😉 Hoping to finish two books for this […]

Updated Cookbook Collection

Posted March 29, 2023 / Food & Drink, Personal / Information / Etc. / 2 Comments

I’m a big fan of food and ever since I tossed aside the idea of dieting, I’ve been in a much happier place with eating it and enjoying it! I’ve posted before about diets and food that I won’t link here because I’m not interested in perpetuating some of those things, but I will link my initial cookbook collection along with their rankings. Today’s post is a bit of an update on that because my cookbook collection has grown exponentially, and factors heavily into how I plan meals (post on that coming soon!). Without further ado, here’s a close-up on my entire cookbook collection as of right now. Skinnytaste Collection These are partially a holdover from my dieting days and I really hate the “Skinnytaste” name, but they’re good cookbooks. I don’t pay attention whatsoever to the calories or information she includes. I preordered the new one coming out later this year because it’s a “Simple” book with five-ingredients or less I think. I have all of the Skinnytaste cookbooks: Air Fryer Dinners Air Fryer Cookbook Original Skinnytaste One and Done Meal Prep Fast and Slow Four of them are larger full-size cookbooks and there are two smaller ones about the air fryer. Generally speaking I’ve made the most recipes from the last three that I listed above. Celebrity Chefs and Other Go-To Books These are some of my favorites and go-to cookbooks! Some of them are brand new and I haven’t read them yet so we’ll see if they […]

Top Ten Tuesdays #402: Recs for Sara Shepard Fans

Posted March 28, 2023 / Top 10 Tuesdays, Weekly Memes / 8 Comments

Books for People Who Liked Sara Shepard Top Ten Tuesdays were started by The Broke and the Bookish and are now hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, where we make lists of our top ten books (or something else!) based on that week’s prompt. The topics are provided ahead of time and can be found here. Book links bring you to Goodreads or my review. I feel like I’m REALLY bad at coming up with author or book comp titles so this was tough for me to pin down! I started to think about the author(s) that I used to love when I first got into reading more as a young adult, and Sara Shepard was the obvious choice. I used to love the Pretty Little Liars books and up until a few years ago, I religiously read every new release she wrote. (I still want to and try to, but I’m a few books behind). I thought it would be fun to recommend some books here for the people like me who loved PLL and Sara Shepard back in the day. Most of these are YA books and I tried to focus on titles that involve a group of girls in high school and/or boarding school, multi-book series, and rich people – I feel like those are the vibes I loved to read about back when I was reading PLL even though PLL didn’t necessarily have all those elements.

ARC Reviews: Off the Map and The Good Luck Cafe

Posted March 27, 2023 / Book Reviews / 0 Comments

`These books were two of my most anticipated contemporary romance reads for this year. They’ve also been sitting on my Kindle for MONTHS and I can’t believe I didn’t read them much earlier than their pub date! Man, this year has flown by. OFF THE MAP is the third (and I believe final?) book in this companion series about the Beck sisters. I’ve loooooved this series so far and am happy to report that I really enjoyed this one! It’s my least favorite of the bunch but still very steamy and swoony and wanderlusty. We follow Anna’s best friend, Carla (so not really a Beck sister), as she is heading to *spoiler for book one* Anna’s wedding in Keane’s home of Ireland. Keane’s brother, Eamon (who we met in the first book) is due to pick her up and bring her to the wedding. Sparks fly between them right away and the night quickly gets away from them in the bar… and then Keane’s apartment. Carla has been traveling most of her life and avoiding her dad’s dementia diagnosis, and Eamon is dying to break out of his routine and do the same kind of thing. You’d think that would make things easier for them but it doesn’t, of course! The two of them take some detours on the way to the wedding and really enjoy each other’s company. They have really great chemistry and I actually like how quickly they hooked up. It was more unique for a romance […]

Top Ten Tuesdays #401: TTT Rewind

Posted March 21, 2023 / Top 10 Tuesdays, Weekly Memes / 0 Comments

TTT Rewind: Books I Liked More or Less Than I Thought I Would Top Ten Tuesdays were started by The Broke and the Bookish and are now hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, where we make lists of our top ten books (or something else!) based on that week’s prompt. The topics are provided ahead of time and can be found here. Book links bring you to Goodreads or my review. This is so fun! There was a period of time where I was barely blogging and skipped a bunch of TTTs so I tried to go back and see if any of them looked good to rewind and do today. It ended up being too challenging to track down so I thought I would do a random number generator to pick which post to try. If it was something super specific I would just keep going until one struck my fancy, but this worked out really well on the first try! I got TTT #333: Top Ten Books I Liked More/Less Than I Thought I Would! I have Goodreads shelves up for the task so I went and looked at my “pleasant surprise” and “super disappointing” shelves to grab five of each. For kicks, here are the books I picked back when I first did this prompt in 2017. Liked More than Expected All of these books exceeded my expectations in one way or another! I wasn’t sure the hype would be worth it or they weren’t my usual topics to read about, and they […]

Review Roundup | The Heart Principle, Mirror Lake, and Remarkably Bright Creatures

Posted March 20, 2023 / Book Reviews, Review Roundup / 0 Comments

THE HEART PRINCIPLE was one of my most-anticipated releases of 2021. I was thrilled when it was a BOTM selection and I could read it right away! And then… it sat on my shelf until March of 2023. I don’t know why I never got around to picking it up. I think I wasn’t expecting to love this as much as the other two in this companion series? It had a lot to live up to. I rated the first book 4.5 stars and the second book 5 stars, so where would this one land? I didn’t remember the two previous books that well but it’s a companion series, so that wasn’t an issue. We’re introduced to Anna, a professional violinist who is stuck in a major rut with her music. Her longtime boyfriend suggests they have an open relationship for a bit before taking the next step and she’s too angry to argue. She hops on a dating app and decides that if he can have a one-night stand or two, so can she. She’s introduced to our boy Quan (love) and they fail at hooking up a few times but can’t seem to leave it at that. I really loved the relationship that Quan and Anna built – it was so sweet and wholesome! Both of them had some major issues they were dealing with and slowly began to open up to each other. When Anna’s father becomes very ill, she’s tasked with helping him and the family, […]

Spring & Summer Review Copies

Posted March 17, 2023 / Book Lists, Features, TBR Lists / 0 Comments

I always do my seasonal TBRs with new releases coming out that season that I DON’T have review copies for. I thought it would be fun to do a separate TBR here for the spring into summer with review copies that I have and am excited to read. There are so many great books (especially romances) coming out in April and beyond that I want to share what I’ve got waiting for me on my Kindle! April May June July

I’m Reading Hyped/Popular Books This Year

Posted March 15, 2023 / Discussions, Features / 2 Comments

I feel like most people fall into two camps: those who keep up with the hottest and most hyped releases, and those who pretty much refuse to do so (with some exceptions). I think I’ve been more of the latter in recent years because my reading time, energy, and interest has been so limited. I’m sick of talking about it and you’re sick of reading about it by now but yes, my reading life has been crappy since mid-2020. This year, it’s like I’m reinvigorated and back to my old self. I’m finding myself more curious about all the books and adding them to my TBR, even when I’m not sure they’re for “me.” I’m going out of my way to read books that are hyped and seeing if they are as good as everyone says. Many of these overhyped releases are usually literary fiction and that’s kind of the main reason I’ve stayed away, especially in recent years. I don’t love books with heavy topics or ones that make me sad (especially for contemporary fiction – it’s different for me if it’s a mystery or thriller). I just don’t gravitate toward those topics when I read because I like to either solve a crime or be happy in a romance haha. I don’t know what it is about this year that has me wanting to keep up with the Joneses but I’m having a lot of fun doing it, if I’m being honest! Instead of saying “ugh I won’t ever […]

Top Ten Tuesdays #400: Spring TBR

Posted March 14, 2023 / Top 10 Tuesdays, Weekly Memes / 6 Comments

Spring TBR – April/May Releases Top Ten Tuesdays were started by The Broke and the Bookish and are now hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl, where we make lists of our top ten books (or something else!) based on that week’s prompt. The topics are provided ahead of time and can be found here. Book links bring you to Goodreads or my review. Always love a seasonal TBR around these parts! As usual, I’m going to highlight the new and upcoming releases this spring rather than the books I have for review. These are new releases that I plan to read ASAP this spring. I usually include the months of April, May, and June here for this season but I had way too many between April and May! April Releases May Releases

Review Roundup | The Do-Over, The Appeal, and Cold Clay

Posted March 13, 2023 / Book Reviews, Review Roundup / 0 Comments

I’m a sucker for Groundhog Day / time loop stories, as everyone knows by now. I was intrigued by THE DO-OVER when I saw so many people reading it but didn’t set out on a mission to read it until (a) I realized it was a Groundhog Day book and (b) it took place on Valentines Day. I was so determined to read it during Valentines Day that I went to three different stores and attempted two store pick-up orders before I finally snagged it in the fifth and final attempt (another Target store pickup). When Emilie sees her boyfriend cheating on her on Valentines Day, she wakes up the next day only to find it is yet again Valentines Day. Can she stop him from cheating? Does she even want to? The story progresses in a similar way to other time loop stories with the MC trying new ways to live out the day and see if it resets the loop. She ends up getting close to Nick, her surly lab partner, on and off throughout the days and sparks fly on one of her repeating days. All in all, the book was really cute and enjoyable to read! There were absolutely has some cringe-worthy levels of cheesiness toward the end but I got through it. Every Groundhog Day book has at least one day where the MC does whatever they want, damn the consequences, because there ARE no consequences. That particular day for Emilie was definitely cringey. These […]