Choosing my reading goals for a given year is always difficult because I tend to greatly overestimate my capabilities with full knowledge that I am doing so. It’s just me being delusional, but at least it’s me being delusional with a purpose. This year, my goals are almost all centered around simplifying my reading life and being more consistent with my online book presence. I feel a little more confident than I usually do with my yearly reading goals, since the goals will all hopefully work in tandem, rather than being a dozen separate goals. Without further ado, let’s go ahead and get into t ..read more

Hi all! It’s been a while since I posted regularly on this blog. I’ve definitely taken a step back from it in the past year or so, and I do have a good reason for that: I started a BookTube channel! I started my channel back in July, and while it was definitely a learning curve to start with, despite having some training in video editing, I feel like I’m finally in a good rhythm with it where I can try and get back into my other forms of bookish social media (namely this blog and Instagram). One of my big goals for this year is to get back to posting on this blog regularly. I think it allows f ..read more

If Emma Lord has 10,000 fans, I am one of them. If Emma Lord has one fan, it is me. If Emma Lord has no fans, I am dead. This was so cute! It honestly might have won the title of my favorite Emma Lord book (an honor previously shared between You Have a Match and Begin Again. This follows our main character, Riley, who moves to NYC the summer after she graduates high school to reunite with her long-distance best friend and complete a bucket list they had had running for years. When she gets there, to nobody’s surprise, her best friend, Tom, has gotten very attractive, and soon th ..read more

Just Lizzie, by Karen Wilfrid, is a lovely middle grade contemporary following Lizzie, an 8th grader dealing with a lot of changes in her life. Her family just had to move neighborhoods after a traumatic experience with a neighbor, her brother moved to college, and she is surrounded by friends who are all having their first romantic experiences while she feels completely alien, never having had a crush. When she learns about asexuality, she finally feels like she fits, but navigating that self-discovery and trying to share that part of her identity with those close to her proves difficult. As ..read more

Bring Me Your Midnight, by Rachel Griffin, is a YA standalone fantasy following a coven of witches living on an island with only a small stretch of sea separating them from the mainlanders who fear and seek to control their magic. Tana, the daughter of a prominent family in the coven, has been arranged to marry the governor’s son to establish an alliance that would mean security and protection for her fellow witches. When she meets a boy who practices the “dangerous” magic she’s always been taught to shun, she must question how much of herself she is willing to sacrifice for the sake of peace ..read more

If You Still Recognize Me, by Cynthia So, follows Elsie, a closeted bisexual girl, during the summer before university. After pining after her online friend, Ada, for years, she has decided that she will finally tell her her feelings. However, when her childhood best friend, Joan, comes back into her life, Elsie’s plans in that regard get derailed. This book felt like such a hug during Pride Month. I was expecting a summer rom-com, but it turned out to be a lovely book about grief, family, and queer community. I have a complicated relationship with Elsie as our main character. One the one hand ..read more

Wings Once Cursed & Bound, by Piper J. Drake, follows Peeraphan Rahttana, also known as Punch, a woman hiding her identity as a kinnaree, a mythical Thai bird princess. When she’s tricked into wearing the cursed red dancing shoes of legend, a vampire named Bennett sweeps her into a world of supernatural beings while they try to figure out how to save her from the curse. As she and Bennett grow closer and Peeraphan finds herself appreciating the chance not to have to hide her identity, she ultimately must face the truth of what she is and whether she is willing to do what it takes to keep h ..read more

Hot Dutch Daydream, by Kristy Boyce, follows Sage Cunningham, an American girl who is spending the summer nannying for a three-year-old Dutch boy in exchange for his mother, Sage’s mentor, flying her out to the Netherlands to intern under her and attend a conference. What Sage wasn’t expecting was for Dr. Reese to also have a teenage son at home, Ryland, who is Sage’s opposite in almost every way. When Ryland and Sage strike a deal where she will keep him focused on his art in exchange for his help with his half-brother, the two find themselves growing closer. The catch? Dr. Reese has made it ..read more

Mirror to Mirror, by Rajani LaRocca Mirror to Mirror, by Rajani LaRocca, is a sweet middle-grade verse novel dealing with the relationships between twin sisters Maya and Chaya. Maya has been dealing with horrible anxiety and Chaya is the only one who knows about it. When Chaya convinces herself that she is the source of Maya’s anxiety and starts to pull away, their relationship becomes strained. The story follows how the sisters grow apart in interests, but draws on the powerful connection between the two to show how they find their ways back to each other. I really enjoyed this book. Maya an ..read more

It’s been a long time since I’ve done a wrap-up, so I thought I’d catch y’all up to speed on what I’ve been reading so far this year! As of March 31, 2023, I had read 39 books, which was quite a bit ahead of schedule for my goal this year of reading 125. It’s possible that around the halfway mark of this year that I’ll bump the goal up to 150 books, but that’s a problem for future-me. Here’s my breakdown and thoughts for each month so far: January I read 14 books in January, which I’m quite satisfied with in terms of quantity, though the quality of the books I read was lacking to say the least ..read more