Tag Archives: Goals

2024 Goals Recap: Stats and Updates

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The Story Sanctuary 2024 Goals Recap with art that shows a cat climbing a stack of books behind a cat lying down and winking next to a girl with a newsboy cap and goggles waving. Art by @Sennydoesarty.

My December plans got swallowed up by holiday celebrations and time spent with visiting family, but I’m back at my laptop and reviewing my reading and blogging progress from last year for this 2024 goals recap.

I started 2024 with ambitious goals and plans to make blogging a little easier and more joyful. As I’m looking back, it’s nice to see the places where I made significant progress. I read more books (261) than my stated goal (200). I even knocked out quite a few backlist titles (73) I’d really wanted to read.

If you’re looking for my favorites of last year, you’ll find them in this post of my top ten favorites from 2024. This post will focus on recapping goals and sharing my reading stats.

Here’s a quick breakdown of some facts and figures from my reading life in 2024. Prepare to geek out over charts with me!

Books Read in 2024 by Age Group

Since I’ve been blogging, the bulk of the books I read in a year are generally young adult books. This year, just over one-third were for a middle-grade audience. The biggest surprise is that I read fifteen books marketed toward adults. Most of those were nonfiction titles, but I think a couple of fiction titles slipped into the mix as well.

Types of Books I Read in 2024

While most of what I read in 2024 were full-length novels, I read a lot more nonfiction than I realized. Years ago, when I started prioritizing reading a little more nonfiction, my goal was to read one nonfiction title per month. This year, I read an average of five per month.

The poetry classification mostly refers to novels in verse, I think. I read one poetry collection. I’m hoping to read more poetry this year.

Frontlist vs. Backlist

Another goal I had in 2024 was to read some titles that had been languishing on my backlist reading list. (Books I wanted to read that came out before 2024.) I joined a couple of challenges and created a couple of reading lists that helped me focus on books I wanted to read. Audiobooks were a huge help here, too. A lot of the audiobooks I listened to were backlist titles. Altogether, I read 187 books published in 2024 and 73 published before that.

Format Breakdown

I was kind of all over the place with the formats of the books I read. A little over half were digital, which tracks since I’m still pretty divided about whether I prefer physical copies or ebooks. I love the ability to frequently flip quickly from one spot to another, like from where you’re reading to a map or character list, that you get in a physical book. But I love the convenience of ebooks. Oh, I finished my book, but I’m all cozy under the covers of my bed and it’s cold out there? No worries. I don’t have to get up, I can just start another ebook!

Goals Recap

Read Harder 2024 Challenge

2024 was my second year participating in Book Riot’s Read Hard(er) challenge. The prompts help me read more inclusively and have led me to books I sincerely enjoyed. I completed 23 out of 24 of the challenge prompts. The only one I missed was about reading a book by an author and then attending an event (in person or online) with them. I signed up for a few virtual author events, but something always prevented me from going. I love that idea, though, so I may try to do some virtual events this year.

Beat the Backlist Challenge

For the second year in a row, I also joined the Beat the Backlist challenge hosted by Austine Decker. I completed 41 out of 52 prompts, which I’m calling a win. I read 73 books published before 2024, so the challenge definitely helped me get to some of the titles that had been on my reading list for a while.

Read the Top Ten Most Frequently Challenged Books Project

Oof. Okay, so I had planned to write a post during Banned Books Week in September to highlight the top ten most frequently challenged books of 2023 and talk about book banning in general. I didn’t finish reading all the books on the list in time, and frankly, I started to doubt how helpful a post like that would be. Though I still have mixed feelings, I want to continue reading banned books so I’m informed about specific titles. I want to pair that effort with action that helps challenge book bans more directly, so I’m considering connecting those two projects for 2025.

By the end of the year, I managed to read all ten most frequently challenged books. I suspect some of the same titles will appear on the list this year, so maybe that will give me more time to find the right focus for the project this year.

Community Goals

One of the things I hoped to do in 2024 was post more lists and participate in a bookish community in some way. I was inconsistent with my list posts, especially this past fall. That was disappointing, but I’m shaking off the dust of that defeat and ready to try again this year.

I found a group of KidLit bloggers that do monthly virtual meet-ups, and that’s been truly an incredible experience. It’s so much fun to talk to people who read KidLit and want to talk about them, plus understand the ins and outs of running a blog. I’ve had a great time at every event I’ve attended. We’re starting a spin-off quarterly book club, and I’m super excited about that, too.

I’m still struggling to manage my review schedule and book hoard, but I sent several boxes of books to a detention center I heard about via Sentences Book Donations and a few more to a charity collecting books for Western North Carolina after Hurricane Helene. I feel good about that and will donate more books this year. I’m working on a blog post about places to send books for donation, so keep an eye out for that soon!

Process Goals

Some of my goals for 2024 had to do with my processes of selecting which books to review and managing the number of books that I keep versus give away after reading them. I found mixed success here.

Regarding which books I reviewed, I started noting which books I received that I requested versus books that I did not request. (These usually come from publishers I’ve worked with before.) That helped me prioritize the books I specifically asked to read and review and fit in the unsolicited ones when I had extra time.

I’ve tweaked that process a bit this year, making more small changes that I hope will help me be more organized. I feel pretty good about it.

I also used more of the stats and information in the reading tracker spreadsheet I used again last year. (That’s where the chart info above came from!) I’m happy with that and looking forward to continuing with the spreadsheet in 2025.

What goals did you meet for 2024?

Did you set reading goals for yourself for last year? If so, were you successful in meeting them? Leave a comment and let me know how you did.

If you posted a 2024 goals recap, please leave me a link to your post below!

Top Ten Tuesday: Bookish Goals for 2025

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Top Ten Tuesday: Bookish Goals for 2025

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl. This week’s topic is a really great one: bookish goals for 2025!

FIRST OF ALL. Did you see this adorable artwork of me and my two cats that Senny designed for me? You can find her on Instagram at @sennydoesarty. She’s amazing. I can’t recommend her enough. I am redesigning my blog banner to include these images, but it’s taking me forever, and I can’t wait any longer to share them.

This year, I plan to repeat some of the same reading challenges that I’ve been part of before. It does seem to help me read backlist titles more consistently, and it’s fun to look for books that meet each prompt.

Organization is still a goal, but I’m struggling to clarify what that looks like for me. I’m having a hard time keeping up with the clutter in general, and having a ton of books coming in and out of the house for review doesn’t help that, but I haven’t hit on a great solution yet.

At any rate, here is my list of goals.

Bookish Goals for 2025

1. Beat the Backlist Reading Challenge

This will be my third year participating in the Beat the Backlist Reading Challenge, hosted by Austine Decker. This one REALLY helped me tackle backlist titles. In 2023, my first year doing the challenge, I read about 30 books from my backlist TBR. Last year, I read more than 60. (I probably added double that to my reading list, so I’m still making negative progress toward reading all the books, but hey… there are worse problems to have!)

2. Book Riot’s Read Hard(er) 2025 Reading Challenge

Read Hard(er) is another challenge that I tracked last year and really enjoyed. I like that it helped me make more inclusive reading choices and think about the topics in the books I was reading. I’m excited about doing this challenge again this year, and some of the prompts for the Read Harder 2025 Challenge look awesome.

Reading diversely has been a longterm goal, and this list helps me pick books purposefully and broadly.

3. Read 200 Books

Last year my goal was to read 200 books, and I’m sticking with that for this year. It’s a comfortable goal for the amount of time I’m able to read.

4. Read 3-5 More Classics/Critically Acclaimed Books, Especially Those by Marginalized Authors

This is part of an ongoing quest to read more inclusively. There are a lot of great writers and stories that didn’t make it into my (very white) public school education, so it’s time to make up some ground. Topping my list at this moment: James Baldwin and Octavia Butler.

5. Feature Books in More Themed Lists

I love sharing reviews, but I am not sure those are the most helpful posts about books. I love reading lists about different kinds of books: great books about summer camp, or kids in foster care, or kids going to a magic school. I’d like to write more list posts like that this year.

6. Continue Using a Reading Tracker Spreadsheet

I spent some time customizing the reading tracker spreadsheet I’ve been using, and I’d like to tweak it even more this year. I love having interesting stats and reminders and reading challenge progress all in one place. The original sheet came from a blog called Addicted to Romance. The blog no longer exists but you can find the blogger on Instagram.

7. Donate More Books and Support Bookish Charities

I can’t keep all the books I review, and even if I could, what good are they sitting on my shelf? I want to find homes where they’ll be read and enjoyed. This year, I’m going to try to send out one box of books or make a monetary donation to a bookish charity each month.

8. Take Reading Breaks When Necessary and Stop Feeling Guilty About It

This year, I had several periods when I couldn’t keep up with my reading plans. Sometimes, it was because I was unwell. Other times, I was just so busy that by the time I sat down at the end of the day, I fell asleep. Stress and anxiety played a role as well.

I spent a lot of time worrying about the authors and publishers I was letting down by falling behind on my reading. A few noticed and sent emails. Some may have noticed and not said anything. Others probably didn’t notice at all.

This is another reason I’d like to get better at list posts as a way to talk about books when I don’t have the time or energy to read them all.

9. Connect with Other Bloggers/Reviewers

I’ve had a great time connecting with other Kidlit reviewers this past year, and I’d like to continue that into this coming year. I set up a link on my home page to click into WordPress Reader and keep up with my blogging friends’ posts easily.

10. Read a poem every day.

Poetry is an art form that I don’t feel well informed about or very good at reading, and I’d like to broaden my experience with it and deepen my ability to understand it. In one of the books I read this year (Why We Read by Shannon Reed), the author had a similar struggle and decided to read one poem per day. She found it a much more manageable amount of poetry to consume at a time and a helpful habit. I’ll give it a try and see if it works for me.

What are your bookish goals for 2025?

I’d love to hear about your reading plans for this year. Are any of my goals similar to the ones on your list?

If goals are too structured or anxiety-inducing, leave a comment and let me know what bookish event (book release, conference, author event, book you want to read, etc.) you’re most looking forward to this year.

Mid-Year Reading Check-in and July Reading Scramble

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Mid-Year Reading Check-in and July Reading Scramble

The summer is flying by this year, but I wanted to make time to pause for a moment and check in on the goals I set for the year. I’m also doing a Mid-year Reading Scramble with The Word N3rd this month, so I’ll post my catch-up reading plans as well.

This whole year has been packed with unexpected challenges and changes so far. From health things to stuff with my girls, I have struggled to keep up with reading and blogging more than in previous years. While I try my best not to stress about my goals, it does help to have things quantified and written down so that I can look back and note the progress I made.

Goals for 2024

To see my full list of goals for the year, check out my Bookish Goals for 2024 post. Otherwise, grab a drink and let’s get down to it.

Goal: Beat the Backlist Reading Challenge

There are 52 optional prompts in the Beat the Backlist Reading Challenge. So far, I’ve completed 20 of them. Not quite half, but not too shabby, if I say so myself. Last year I completed 19 out of 24 prompts, so I’m tracking at that same pace so far this year. Highlights from the challenge? Glad you asked!

I’ve ended up reading several titles that have been on my reading list for YEARS, and I’ve mostly enjoyed them. The audiobook version of The Color Purple is amazing– it’s got some explicit abuse, so read carefully– I imagine this won’t be the only time I listen to the story. It’s a powerful story.

I finally read Nimona because my daughter wanted to watch the movie, and I prefer to read the book first if possible. I loved it, and having seen the movie now, too, I think it captures the heart of the story really well even if some of the events play out a bit differently.

A friend had given me a copy of The Hazel Wood years ago, and I kept promising myself I’d read it. While waiting on a hold through my library, I noticed that the audiobook version of this one was available, so I dove in. And, wow. It’s not the story I expected, but I got lost in the twisty, dark fairytales and the quest to bring family back together.

Goal: Read Harder Reading Challenge

I’m also working on the Read Hard(er) Challenge by Book Riot, which has 24 prompts. At this point, I’ve completed 13 of them, which is right on track. Here are a few favorites…

Killers of the Flower Moon was an impulse read. My library had the audiobook version, and the title was too intriguing to pass up. It opened up a chapter of history I knew almost nothing about (thank you, Florida education system) and completely blew me away. I highly recommend it.

Black Girl You Are Atlas was on my reading list, and in fact, I already owned the ebook version because I love Renée Watson and will read anything she writes. The poems are powerful and inspiring, and the collage illustrations are absolutely breathtaking.

Conditions of a Heart is a contemporary romance about a girl with Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, which I wasn’t familiar with. The story explores Brynn’s experience navigating high school life and relationships and her conflicting feelings about talking to others about her disability.

Goal: Read 200 Books

I’m totally on track for this. As of the end of June, I’d read almost 140 books this year. I’ve had a wacky year with some health stuff coming up and parenting challenges, so I’m pretty proud to have read so many. About 20 I read as audiobooks, and another 20 are graphic novels, so that does make it a little easier to keep this kind of pace.

Goal: Read 3-5 More Classics, Especially by Women or BIPOC

This has been another ongoing project for me. There are a ton of classic works that I simply haven’t read, and I’d like to add a few to the list of those I’ve read each year. Here’s what I’ve read this year besides The Color Purple, which I talked about already.

Wuthering Heights was a reread for me since I read it in high school. I remember that I didn’t like it then, but I didn’t like Pride and Prejudice when I read it in school, either, and it’s a favorite now. I gave it another chance, and I’m sorry to say it’s still a massive nope for me. Too many people abuse one another around a narrator who is powerless to stop them.

This year I read Sense and Sensibility for the first time. It was a little confusing, since I’m fairly familiar with the BBC movie version, so I actually listened to the audiobook more than once because some scenes happened so differently than the movie shows. I enjoyed it a lot, though. When I’m not reading Austen, I always forget how funny she is.

Another classic on my reading list for a LONG time is I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou. I listened to the audiobook version read by the author, and wow. She writes so emotively about how children think and perceive things. The book describes a time in history that I don’t think I’ve ever read about from a Black author’s perspective– which seems wild to me. (More thanks, Florida education system.)

Goal: Donate Books and Manage the Book Hoard

I think I’ve actually been doing okay with these goals this year. I’ve sent five or six boxes of books to a juvenile detention center through information posted on Sentences Book Donations Facebook page. I’ve donated a few bags of books to my local library as well.

Sorting the book hoard is still a work in progress. I’m close to having a good system for books coming in and going out. I need a basket or designated spot for books I plan to send to a JD center. Once school starts up again, I’ll probably do one more pass through the collection to weed out things I’m ready to let go of, and I’ll have at least one more box or two to donate to the juvenile facility. Then I think I’ll call that goal met.

Mid-Year Reading Scramble with The Word N3rd

I heard about the Mid-year Reading Scramble through Alex at Pucks and Paperbacks channel on YouTube. Since I’ve got a few books that I’m desperate to work into my schedule this month anyway, it seemed like a great way to boost my motivation, get some accountability, and maybe meet some more bookish people. Triple win.

If you want to know more about the Reading Scramble, check out this announcement video from The Word N3rd.

Here are a few of the books on my catch-up list.

There are two titles from Wednesday books on my list as well. I’d also like to read The Complete Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi, Unbecoming by Seema Yasmin, and The Loudest Silence by Sydney Langford.

How is your reading going this year?

If you set goals for yourself, how are you doing? Are you doing any reading challenges or readathon events? Let me know what you’re reading and if you’ve read any of the books I mentioned in this post.

Top Ten Tuesday: Bookish Goals for 2024

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Bookish Goals for 2024

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by Jana at That Artsy Reader Girl. This week’s topic is a really great one– bookish goals for 2024!

Last year I posted this extensive list of goals, some ambitious and some that were pretty reasonable considering my blogging life. At the end of December, I posted an update on my success in meeting those goals.

With all that in mind, I decided to take a slightly different approach to my goal-setting this year. Here are eight bookish goals I’ve set for myself in 2024.

Bookish Goals for 2024

1. Beat the Backlist Reading Challenge

Last year, for the first time, I participated in the Beat the Backlist 2023 Reading Challenge, hosted by Austine Decker, and it REALLY helped me tackle backlist titles. While my goal last year was to read 10-12 backlist fiction books and 3-5 nonfiction titles, I ended up reading more than 30 books from my backlist reading list. So I definitely want to do that again!

2. Book Riot’s Read Hard(er) 2024 Reading Challenge

Read Hard(er) is another challenge that I tracked last year and really enjoyed. I like that it helped me make more inclusive reading choices and think about the topics in the books I was reading. I’m excited about doing this challenge again this year, and some of the prompts for the Read Harder 2024 Challenge look awesome.

3. Read 200 Books

Last year, I set a goal of reading 150 titles, and I figured I would read well over that. I read a mix of mainly young adult, middle grade, and graphic novels, so often, I can read a whole book in a single sitting (if I’m engaged). This year, I’m upping the anty a teeny bit to set a goal of 200.

4. Read 3-5 more classics, especially ones by women or BIPOC.

Last year, I set out to read a few classics, and I actually really enjoyed that. Among the books I read for the first time were LITTLE WOMEN and ANIMAL FARM. This year, I definitely want to finish THE FIRE NEXT TIME by James Baldwin, and I’d love to read I KNOW WHY THE CAGED BIRD SINGS by Maya Angelou.

5. Streamline My Accepted Reviews Process

I need a better process for predicting the books I will want to read in the upcoming publishing season. I can comfortably review about 13 new release books per month, but I feel like my choosing process is chaotic and overwhelming.

Do you use a particular app or website to track books being published in the next season or year? If you’ve got tips you want to share, I’m all ears!

6. Use a Reading Tracker Spreadsheet

I started using a reading tracker spreadsheet last year and liked it a lot. This year, I’m editing it a bit more and making it suit my needs a little better. I’m hoping to use some of the tabs I ignored last year and maybe find ways to use them to help me be better organized without making a lot of extra work recording data.

7. Donate More Books Through Sentences Book Donations

I want to get better at unhauling books I’m finished with. I wrote a post about this a few months ago, right after posting an interview with the founder of a group called Sentences that helps facilitate book donations to prisons, detention centers, and similar facilities.

8. Refill my creative energy more consistently.

I’ll admit I’m not totally sure what this process looks like for me, but I know it’s important. Reading burnout really scares me. Every time I’ve faced it, I’ve been completely blindsided, and I panic because, in those moments, I can’t imagine ever enjoying reading again.

Afterward, I can’t believe I thought something so silly, but then the next time I burn out, I panic again, so there ya go. Brains are weird.

I’m hoping that a combination of some breaks from reading to practice guitar or ukulele or play a video game or something might help me rest my reading muscles and feel more energized when I pick up the next book.

9. Keep up the Community Posts!

List posts can be time-consuming, but they’re one of the most fun ways to talk about books on a blog, I think. This year, I would like to try again to do about one Top Ten Tuesday post and at least one Marvelous Middle Grade Monday post per month.

If you do regular community posts like these, let me know where you heard about them and what they are! I’d love to see what other community posts/memes are out there.

10. Manage the book hoard.

I’m long overdue for a book reorganization. Times have changed. My reading preferences have changed. My kids are older. I would like to go back through my collection of books and decide what it truly makes sense to keep at this season of my life and what it’s time to pass along to new readers.

What are your bookish goals for 2024?

If you’re a goal-oriented person, let me know if we have any similar bookish goals for this year. If goals are too anxiety-inducing, let me know what bookish event (book release, conference, author event, book you really want to read, etc.) you’re most looking forward to this year.

Review: Limitless Roads Café by Samantha Picaro

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Limitless Roads Café
Samantha Picaro
Published May 15, 2023

Amazon | Goodreads

About Limitless Roads Café

Kinsey Fontana relies on lists to navigate the world as an autistic teen. #Goals list: win her dream event planning internship (she knows it’s an ironic dream); master the art of masking; and gain Mom’s approval. Instead, she works at a café hiring teens with disabilities. Although she loves the café and discounted macchiatos, she dreams of more than planning open mic nights.

She has an opportunity to shine by throwing a fundraiser to save the café. The catch: allow her ex-best friend Melissa Castillo to be her assistant and pretend they are friends again so Melissa’s parents respect her.

To-do list: plan the fundraiser with zero fundraising experience; work with the intimidating hotel planner who rejected her for the internship; and use every masking technique to charm rather than repel people from sponsors to a boy band. Although she needs unhealthy amounts of caffeine to handle autistic burnout, Kinsey reconsiders her #Goals list and realizes self-doubt belongs down the drain like incorrect orders.

My Review

Though I’ve read a few other books with autistic characters and authors, I think this is the first book I’ve read with so many disabled characters in it. In the beginning, Kinsey feels no special connection to her coworkers, preferring to keep her head down and get her work done rather than socializing. But when she learns the cafe is at risk of closing, she and the other cafe employees band together to try to save it with a huge community fundraiser. Along the way, she builds relationships not only with her coworkers but with other people she’d written off as bad for one reason or another.

I really liked the way the character relationships developed and changed, especially the relationships between Kinsey and her cafe friends. I also enjoyed the up-close, inside-the-mind feel of the story. The scenes deftly capture social cues Kinsey misses without making it awkward or too obvious. Kinsey’s voice is believable and consistent, even if her choices or responses may be unexpected to some readers. As a member of an Italian family myself, I also loved all the references to Italian language, traditions, and food.

Here and there, I did spot a missing or incorrect word. A couple of times, it seemed like there was maybe a line of dialogue missing from a conversation, so the next line seemed to refer to something that hadn’t happened. I was always able to figure it out and move on really quickly, though.

On the whole, I enjoyed the book and loved the cast of characters. I think this is a great summer read and a nice pick for readers interested in dialogue about ableism and disabled teens.

Content Notes

Recommended for Ages 12 up.

Representation
Kinsey is autistic. She works at a cafe where all the employees are disabled.

Profanity/Crude Language Content
Mild profanity used somewhat frequently.

Romance/Sexual Content
None.

Spiritual Content
Kinsey and her dad attend Italian Mass. Kinsey isn’t sure what she believes about God but finds the service calming.

Violent Content
In several scenes, people use ableist language or behavior. Often Kinsey or other people confront them and point out why what they said or did was problematic. Kinsey and another girl get into a shoving match in a store when Kinsey’s competitiveness spirals out of control.

Drug Content
Kinsey’s parents pressure her to take a drink of wine, which she immediately hates.

Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use, but which help support this blog. I received a free copy of LIMITLESS ROADS CAFE in exchange for my honest review. All opinions my own.

A Very Belated Winter Wrap-Up

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A Very Belated Winter Wrap-Up

Spring has (maybe?) sprung, and here I am scraping together my winter wrap-up. It’s been a busy season! Read on to see the best books I read this season as well as my most popular posts. Finally, I’ll check in on the goals I set for the year and how I’m doing in meeting them.

Winter Wrap-Up Behind the Scenes News

Last year, I started working directly with several new publishers, which means easier access to more of the books I can’t wait to read. Which is good and bad? Because yeowza, my calendar has never been so packed.

I used to limit myself to three reviews per week, but last September, I increased that to four. In January, I increased to five reviews per week.

Honestly, this only works because I’ve been sitting on a backlog of about 40 reviews for backlist books I read sometime last year. Sometimes, though, I’ve needed to read four or five new books per week. I don’t think that’s a sustainable pace, so I’m trying to refine my process for deciding which books to review.

Changes in My What to Review Decision-Making Process

For a long time, I was really just reviewing whatever books looked interesting. I had few enough requests that this made sense and still left me wiggle room to add in backlist titles I couldn’t get review copies of or discovered after publication and wanted to read.

I’ve tried to have an eye toward reading diversely as I select which books to read, but there are definitely holes I would like to fill. For example, I don’t read very many books by Indigenous authors. Not on purpose. I just don’t often get asked to review them, and I haven’t been purposefully seeking them out. So I’m working on that this year.

Lately, though, that’s not the case, and I’m finding that I have to say no to books that look really great. The good news is that my blog viewership has grown enough (thanks to all of you!) that I have access to a larger selection of books. The bad news is that I can’t review them all!

One of the new things that I’m considering as I encounter books by authors I’ve read before is how those past reviews performed in terms of the number of views they received. This was super helpful last week when I was asked to review the sequel to SKANDAR AND THE UNICORN THIEF. When I checked the post performance for my review, I discovered it was one of my top ten best performing posts last year, and it’s in the top twenty for this year so far.

So I’d say the data indicates my readers would be interested in the sequel, so I eagerly accepted the book for review.

Winter Wrap-Up: Top Posts

Technically these are the top five best performing reviews for the first quarter of this year. What’s funny to me is that none of these were posted this quarter. I’m guessing people searched for reviews of RUIN AND RISING because of the release of the second season of the Shadow and Bone series on Netflix. The others have been high performing posts for a while, so I guess there aren’t really any big surprises here.

What’s interesting to me is that I’ve heard other bloggers talk about how their reviews don’t perform well over time in terms of clicks and views, but four out of my top five posts are reviews. (The other is this list of middle grade books I was eagerly anticipating coming out this past winter.)

One of the things that I do which probably helps my stats is to use a plugin that helps me strengthen my SEO for each post. (I use a free one called Yoast.)

Now that we’ve discussed what most of my viewers were reading this past quarter, let’s look at what I was reading!

Best Books I Read This Winter

Middle Grade Favorites

I read 26 middle grade books during the first quarter of this year, and there were some really great ones in that list. These four are my favorites. They’re the ones I still think about even weeks after I finished reading them. I loved the sense of community and celebration of amigurumi and boba tea in IT’S BOBA TIME FOR PEARL LI.

That Gillian McDunn’s latest book, WHEN SEA BECOMES SKY, moved me probably won’t surprise anyone who has followed this blog the last few years. I love her writing and the explorations of deep feelings she brings to the pages of her books.

MIRROR TO MIRROR surprised me with its beautiful celebration of sisterhood and individuality in its spare verse chapters. I loved getting the points of view of both of the twins and seeing the difference in how they viewed each other and themselves.

THE BOY WHO FOLLOWED HIS FATHER INTO AUSCHWITZ is a haunting, true story about a family fractured by World War II and the Holocaust. I couldn’t stop thinking about this book after I’d finished it. It’s definitely worth a read, and does a great job showing the destruction that happened to Jewish families both within and outside concentration camps during World War II.

Young Adult Favorites

I read 39 young adult books from January to March this year. Lots of them were really well done, so it was hard to narrow down to a handful of favorites.

I’ll be honest, I wasn’t sure what to expect picking up MY DEAR HENRY, but wow, was it good. Kalynn Bayron really captured the vibe of the original story and delivered complex, tortured characters in Victorian England. It was so good. Definitely made me want to catch up on the books by this author that I’ve missed.

I WILL FIND YOU AGAIN was another wild card for me. The cover copy made me think a bit of WE WERE LIARS, which is one of my favorite books ever, so that was enough to get me to check it out. And let me tell you, I was NOT disappointed! I’ll definitely keep Sarah Lyu on my radar, because what a compelling, twisty story.

I’ve been a long-time Elizabeth Wein fan, so again, probably not a surprise to see STATELESS on my favorites list if you’ve been reading my reviews for a long time. I was really excited to see a book about a female pilot in the 1930s. Wein does an amazing job showing the tension between nations as Europe nears another World War.

Though it’s got kind of an understated cover, MISSING CLARISSA packed some serious punch. The pacing was perfect, and the characters were compelling enough to propel me through this one all the way to the final page. It’s a definite must-read for fans of ONE OF US IS LYING.

Goals Tracking

At the beginning of the year, I wrote this Top Ten Tuesday post outlining a long list of goals for this year. So how’s that going, you ask? Let’s take a super quick look…

Reading Goals

Goal: Read at least 150 books this year. Update: I’ve read 75 books so far this year, so I’d say I’ve made great progress on this one.

Goal: Say no when my calendar is full. Update: Hahahahahahaha! …. Yeah, this one is a work in progress.

Backlist Reading Goals

Goal: Read and review 3-5 timely classics, preferably by BIPOC. Update: I started both THE FIRE NEXT TIME by James Baldwin and THE HOUSE ON MANGO STREET by Sandra Cisneros, so those I expect to finish this year for sure. I also finally read ANIMAL FARM by George Orwell, which only half-counts toward this goal, because it is definitely timely.

Goal: Read 3-5 backlist TBR nonfiction titles. Update: So far I’ve read one– ALL BOYS AREN’T BLUE by George M. Johnson, so that’s one.

Goal: Read 10-12 backlist TBR fiction titles. Update: I started CLAP WHEN YOU LAND, but haven’t finished it yet.

Bookish List Post Goals

Goal: Post 3-4 Top Ten Tuesday lists each quarter. Update: I posted six TTT lists this quarter. Win!

Goal: Post seasonal most-anticipated lists. Update: I’m on this. Just posted my lists for middle grade and young adult books coming this spring!

Goal: Post lists for monthly celebrations. Update: I did make a list for Holocaust Remembrance Day, but I totally missed both Women’s History month this month and Black History month in February. I’ve got an Earth Day post coming soon. Still a work in progress.

Writing Goals

I listed two writing goals in my original post (publishing another indie book for authors and finishing a novel of my own), and honestly, I haven’t really worked on either of these. Some family stuff has come up that’s made it necessary for me to table both those projects for now. I’m working on a short story currently, and would like to write some essays to sell as well. That seems more manageable right now.

What Would You Like to See More of?

Now that you know what I’m working on and what’s coming soon… what are the things you wish you could see more of on this site? Do you want more lists? More updates like this one? Are you interested in voting on what backlist books I read and review next? Leave a comment and let me know!