I know what you may be thinking… how can there be any pros to having a bad bookish memory?! Well, for me, there are surprisingly quite a few. It’s definitely annoying to forget details about your favorite books, especially when you’re trying to be a Harry Potter showoff to your friends (been there 🙋🏼) It’s not a fun situation most of the time, but I’m going to try to be a little positive here. Because I know my memory is terrible, I have to write my reviews right away. This may sound like a con because I have to force myself to write reviews when I may not be in the mood, but it actually has way more benefits than drawbacks! I know that if I don’t write a review within the first 12 hours of finishing a book, so many of the details will shoot right out of my head. I always sit down to review the book soonafter finishing to I can ensure that my thoughts make it on paper pixels? Many of my blogger friends talk about hating reviews, not writing them early enough, and developing a backlog of read-not-reviewed books. This is just absolutely never an issue for me and I love it. Rereads are WAY better. I used to not bother rereading books because I figured I didn’t have time to read something that I already read. What’s the point when there are new books out there I can read instead?! Well, I definitely realized […]

I love torturing everyone with my posts about books I’m excited for (when they haven’t even been released yet). Making my TBR huge means you get the same treatment, #sorrynotsorry. I’m curious though: where do you guys hear about upcoming releases? I wanted to talk about the most common places I personally learn about new and upcoming book releases or book deals, in hopes that you can show me where you get your info from. I always see people adding books on Goodreads (see point two) and wish I could pay better attention to find out earlier! 1. Cover Snark At the time of writing this post, Christina at A Reader of Fictions has posted over 240 installments of Cover Snark, which are truly my favorite posts to read on a regular basis. She highlights new cover reveals / releases for various books across multiple genres and age targets. I have added countless books to my TBR just because of this feature, especially when certain cover designs catch my eye! There’s a bonus feature of her commentary under each cover and fun Cover Battle polls at the bottom of the post. Without a doubt, this is my favorite way of finding new books to add to my TBR-unreleased Goodreads shelf! 2. Goodreads Statuses I’m pretty obsessed with Goodreads. I use it to track just about everything, from my TBR to books I’ve read to covers I like to books I own to books I want to own to my current reads… you get the […]

I’ve come back to the topic of favorite authors a few times. I’ve wondered what makes and author a favorite to you. I’ve also shared that I often save books by my favorite authors so I always have at least ONE I’ve never read before. Because some fellow bloggers have done some author binge reads lately (like Hannah and Kelly reading Beatriz Williams back-to-back-to-back-etc., or my friend from high school reading all TJR in a row), I started to think about my strange habits with reading books by my favorite authors. I adore the idea of falling in love with an author and enjoying their entire backlist in a row. It sounds like such a great, happy-making binge… but for some reason, I totally could never do it. Do you/can you binge multiple books by the same author in a row, or do you have to separate them? (Not counting a series binge) — Lauren (@bookmarklit) July 12, 2017 It seems like most of you guys can! More power to you. Again, I’m jealous. I just have this thing where unless it’s a full-scale series binge, I can’t read multiple books by the same author in a row. I like the idea of spreading things out more! There are a lot of reasons for this, but the biggest one is to make sure I don’t blend them all together in my head. I have a bad bookish memory as it is! Also, I prefer to keep a couple of books around in […]

Lately I’ve been finishing books and thinking, MAN I could use another book just like that. It’s either because the topic or story was so unique that I can’t stop thinking about it, or the book itself just fully encompasses what I look for in a certain type of book. Today I’m sharing three books or series I’ve read recently that I’m hoping you can provide some comp titles for. Think you can help me out!?

Have you ever finished a few GREAT books and thought… okay, now I kind of need to read a bad book. I’ve read some really solid ones, somewhere between 4-5 stars, and now I need something not-so-great. I call these buffer books because they act as a buffer between allll of the good books. I wouldn’t be surprised if I’m the only weird one, but let’s see. Where’s my logic in this? Let’s discuss. Cleansing the Palette If I read a number of really good books in a row, I’m always waiting for the other shoe to drop. I don’t like to read too many highly anticipated books one after another, just because I could end up ruining them with a book hangover (more on that later). I never want to bang out 5 great, anticipated reads in a row because JUST MAYBE the 6th one will get ruined. I think this often has to do with genre or certain tropes being used a lot. Either way, I like to read some great books and then “cleanse my reading palette” with one I know might be bad in one way or another. Sometimes it’ll be an author that writes ridiculous and addicting stories. Sometimes it’ll be a book I’m reading completely for nostalgia. Sometimes it’ll be an angsty NA that I know will annoy me but I’ve wanted to read for one reason or another. Either way, tossing a book I think will be “bad” in them middle of a few good ones […]

A lot of books end up on my “jazzed up for this” shelf on Goodreads. I made a whole 2015 challenge about the books I MUST read because I was previously so excited for them. So why do I never read them?! This happens way way way too often. Here are some of the books I’m ashamed to admit I haven’t read even though I’ve been ~so excited~ about them for years.    Everything Leads to You by Nina LaCour | This was one of those books I added to my TBR riiiiight before I started blogging. I loved the cover and the Hollywood-centered premise. The Catastrophic History of You & Me by Jess Rothenberg | I love books where people are stuck in between life and death, in that kind of ghost-y afterlife watching their friends and family move on. The Art of Lainey by Paula Stokes | This synopsis has me written all over it, but for some reason I haven’t opened it up yet. I even own this book like an asshole, as usual.    17 First Kisses by Rachael Allen | I loooooved the other Rachael Allen book I read and have had this one sitting around for quite some time. I don’t have excuses because this seems perfect for me. Before I Go by Colleen Oakley | Much like the previous one, I read another Colleen Oakley first. BEFORE I GO has been on my shelf for years and the concept sounds great, but I’m not prepared for the sads. My Heart […]

I’m not too bad about reading series as they’re released. Usually I’m excited about the next, upcoming book, and am able to read it ASAP. I’ve had issues with binging series lately even though I used to LOVE it. I wanted to take a look at some of the series I still need to finish up. Most of these are all fully published and I really just need to decide if it’s worth it to keep reading. Let me know your thoughts!     The Elemental Trilogy by Sherry Thomas Read: The Burning Sky • Number of books left to read: 2 Why I can’t decide: I did enjoy the first book (including the ship!) but I have not felt the NEED to read the next book(s) yet. I’m not sure why. I can’t figure out if I would like these better reading instead of audio, because the audio was good, but it just didn’t keep me as engaged as I’d hoped. Hex Hall series by Rachel Hawkins Read: Hex Hall • Number of books left to read: 3 Why I can’t decide: Again, I did like the first book. I even started the second one and then put it aside for a little bit. I’m intrigued to see what will happen next but clearly not interested enough to keep going in binge form. This would be a good one to just roll from one to the next, because the first one was quick, but still. Worldwalker series by Rachel Hawkins Read: Trial By Fire • Number […]

I REALLY WISH I KNEW, OKAY? I’ve always been a huge fan of audiobooks, but I honestly like them more in theory instead of in practice… which means that I force myself to listen to them in order to read more books. Don’t get me wrong: the idea of reading ALL the time when I’d usually be doing anything else (cooking, showering, driving, putting makeup on, etc.) is fantastic. I’ve always been under the impression, though, that the audio format impacts my reading and my ratings more than other formats do. A bad narrator can ruin a book completely. I can lose focus and not pay attention to what’s happening, which causes me to rate the book lower because I “feel like nothing happened.” 🙄 I set out today to explore which audiobook genre is the best for me, and see how ratings are impacted by the genre combination. Audio Ratings by Genre I came to an interesting and unexpected conclusion when I looked at my statistics. My average rating for audiobooks in 2016 was 3.8 stars, which is exactly the same as my overall rating for books in all other formats (ebooks, physical copies, advanced copies, etc.). So it looks like I really don’t rate audiobooks any lower than I rate my other books, even though it feels that way for some reason. Here are my ratings for audiobooks by genre: Contemporary audiobooks: 3.5 stars Fantasy audiobooks: 4.1 stars Paranormal audiobooks: 3.9 stars Retelling audiobooks: 3.5 stars Dystopia audiobooks: 2.7 stars I don’t read […]