95% of my TBRs include contemporary books and mystery/thriller/suspense-types. Anything under fantasy or science fiction umbrellas tend to be graphic novels, and my nonfiction reads are always cookbooks. I’ve been reading a lot less than usual so I tend to avoid “heavy” or slower books, which I tend to associate with fantasy. Since 2020, I’ve only read 14 fantasy novels (which includes a *reread* of the ACOTAR series), plus 6 more books that were paranormal-ish or lighter fantasy). Looking at one of my genre pie charts from the past few years, the fictional (novels only) books outside of contemporary and mystery/thriller account for only 10% of my reads! Over the past couple of years, my fantasy/paranormal reads have only included books by SJM (rereads included), the next book in the WAYWARD CHILDREN series, anything by Holly Black or Libba Bray or Leigh Bardugo, and a few other random reads. In my quest to add more 2023 books to my Goodreads TBR, I found a lot of fun fantasy novels (and some sci-fi or other genres) and thought THIS post would be a great place to share those books. I hope it inspires me to pick up more non-contemporary or non-mystery books in 2023. Recently Published (2022) Some of these are by favorite/previously read authors like Susan Dennard, Holly Black, Brigid Kemmerer, Jenna Evans Welch, and Sandhya Menon. Others are new to me and recommended by various lists, booktubers, etc. over the last year. Backlist Titles Kind of the same thing […]

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. January TBR January is about getting ahead or staying on track with review copies. My lowkey goal is to read 7 books most months this year – if I can manage that for 8 out of 12 months, I’ll stay on track with my goal of 80 books for 2023. This month’s TBR features the aforementioned review copies coming up, some new cookbooks, and other new and exciting releases. Review Copies I managed to snag FINALY DONOVAN JUMPS THE GUN as an audiobook review copy, which is awesome – I’ve listened to this whole series by audio so far. I have an egalley of THE VILLA that I should get to ASAP as well. Other review copies on deck include BEGIN AGAIN (one of my fave authors!) and JUST THE NICEST COUPLE (blog tour). Owned Books I bought SHELF COOKING 101 late last year but knew I wouldn’t be able to fit it in. I hope to get to this one and/or DAMN DELICIOUS in January. I need the excitement of a new cookbook to get me going this month!   I preordered both THE STOLEN HEIR (out this week) and FIVE […]

EOY TBR to Finish My Challenge As of right this second, I need to finish 20 more books to finish off my Goodreads challenge. Usually that wouldn’t be an issue but I really have not been reading as much as usual lately. Days or weeks pass and I realize I haven’t finished a book! I wrote a post a bit ago predicting the books I would read to finish my challenge and decided to make this end-of-year TBR without checking out that post. I have more than 20 options, including 1-2 books I’m reading right now as I write this. I figured I’d do a quick November/December TBR since it’s almost December and I really have to get going on reading. Contemporary I have a nice mix of new releases, egalleys, and hardcovers here, from various locations and sources! These are all books I was looking forward to getting to this year and hope to have time for. ANON PLS is a new release that is bound to be addicting and exactly what I need. I usually blaze through Helen Hoang and Lauren Layne books too, so here’s hoping there’s some quick reads here! Holiday Romance Naturally this is the biggest section on my list! I always have lofty goals to read a ton of holiday books. I’m currently reading A SEASON FOR SECOND CHANCES and it’s been a nice lead-in to the holiday season: it begins around September and works through Halloween and other holidays before getting to Christmas… […]

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. October and November TBR I thought I would have a fun TBR method in September and I just really did not read enough. I did manage to read or start four books from that TBR though! I’m a little late at posting this so I figured I’d include books for my October and November reading plans. I’ll probably focus mostly on non-holiday books since I usually post a holiday book TBR separately. I read those most often in December but I certainly sprinkle them in throughout the last three months. Review Copies I have a decent mix of books here – there are some seasonal reads like WITCHFUL THINKING and SPELLS FOR LOST THINGS, a couple of magical realism books like THREE KISSES ONE MIDNIGHT and THE REWIND, a mystery like NINE LIARS, and a contemporary like RIVALS. Owned Books I’ve been really meaning to read THE AGATHAS for a while now and I don’t know why I’ve been delayed! I hope to read YOU’RE INVITED for the Literally Dead Book Club in October (finally participating!). And finally, SAGA volume 10 was just delivered and I’m pumped to get back into these […]

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. September TBR I’m doing something a little different for my TBR this month. After having a lot of success with my 7 books in 7 days challenge, I knew I wanted to challenge myself in a different way to get going on my goal. I definitely didn’t want to read 7 books in a week again because it was a lot of pressure, but I came up with something fun to do for the month of September. My goal is to read at least two books a week but I would prefer three, especially in the weeks before we go to Hawaii. I recently broke my “EOY TBR Predictions” post into a few categories of books: comic, cookbook, magical, mystery, contemp, and holiday. For the month of September, I’m going to aim to read or start three books each week from the three biggest categories: magical, mystery, and contemporary. The Categories Magical: books that involve some kind of magic. This could be magical realism, time travel-ish things / parallel universe kinds of books, or fantasy/paranormal books. Mystery: a catch-all for mysteries, thrillers, and any crime-related fiction I may read. This includes the vaguely mysterious […]

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. July and August TBR I did a ton of TBR posts in the last couple of weeks so I kind of forgot to do my standard monthly TBR! I’ve talked about my summer TBR, the upcoming summer releases I’m excited for, and the books I plan to read in the second half of the year in order to finish my Goodreads challenge. We’re halfway through July now and I’ve finished two books so far (not shown below), so I thought I’d pull together the books I’ll read in the second half of this month as well as August. Review Copies I was able to complete THE COUNSELORS and THE DEAD ROMANTICS (which wasn’t on my actual TBR for the month) so a few of those aren’t here. I started one other book from my June TBR but ended up DNFing it. For July and August, I hope to read some contemporary romances (SOMETHING WILDER, THE TRUE LOVE BOOKSHOP, and THE HOOKUP PLAN). I hope to get to CARRIE SOTO IS BACK over the next month as well, which is more of a contemporary fiction kind of book? Not sure about the romance […]

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. June TBR I got behind yet again in April because I spent the last week of the month with friends on a vacation, which meant I didn’t really have solo time for reading… despite hoping I’d get to enjoy some time with my books in the hot tub! In any case, I hope (as usual) that I can get back on track in May. The month is somewhat busy at the beginning but I’m hoping some car rides will allow for audiobooks… woof. Review Copies I’d love to get ahead on some review copies that are coming out later this summer, like SUMMER ON BLACKBERRY BEACH and THE TRUE LOVE BOOKSHOP. I’m desperately needing some summery romance books so a few of these will hit the mark! SOMETHING WILDER is the latest Christina Lauren and I actually don’t even know what it’s about, but it looks summery. I’ve also been super into thrillers lately so I’m hoping that I’ll keep up with reading those, like VERY BAD PEOPLE and THE COUNSELORS. And finally, I have an audio review copy of I KISSED SHARA WHEELER – I really hope to get to that […]

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. May TBR I got behind yet again in April because I spent the last week of the month with friends on a vacation, which meant I didn’t really have solo time for reading… despite hoping I’d get to enjoy some time with my books in the hot tub! In any case, I hope (as usual) that I can get back on track in May. The month is somewhat busy at the beginning but I’m hoping some car rides will allow for audiobooks… woof. Review Copies I did a great job of focusing on upcoming releases in April – I love when I can delete covers from the previous month’s TBR here! The only holdover is ALWAYS JANE. Usually I dive right into Jenn Bennett books but this one hasn’t had amazing reviews, so I’ve been hesitating. I recently got a review copy of THE CHANGE and it’s actually already been published so hopefully I’ll get to it soon. Seems intriguing! Otherwise, VERY BAD PEOPLE and SEE YOU YESTERDAY are early May pubs so I should hop on them as well. I have other May egalleys I want to read but I’ll leave […]