Last time I posted a status update was for February. Work was pretty crazy after this and between that, my son having surgery in April, and just generally not getting as much reading done and not having as many updates – I decided to do these updates more on a quarterly basis than monthly. I have been getting more reading this past month but still not where I might normally be. My family and work have been taking a precedence over reading – plus I have been watching a couple new shows. For anyone that hasn’t watched Ted Lasso – I highly recommend it, it is so wholesome! Anyways, here is my reading progress for the last couple months.
Fix Her Up and Tools of Engagement – both by Tessa Bailey
Upcoming TBR List:
Catch up on books I missed in the last couple months
The Hookup Plan by Farrah Rochon (8/2)
Something in the Heir by Suzanna Enoch (9/20)
A Merry Little Meet Cute by Sierra Simone and Julie Murphy (9/20)
I have a vacation coming up next month (August) that will be very reading focused, which I’m looking forward to. Work will take up a lot of my time until then but I’m trying to find a balance! Hope everyone out there is enjoying the summer so far and has been finding something good to read. Happy reading!
February went by in a flash. Its been so busy at work and, with this being my first busy season with a baby at home, I’ve been struggling to get everything done. Suffice it to say I haven’t been reading as much as I might have at this time last year but I’m hoping to read more once busy season is over. But here is my reading progress for February:
Nothing on the March reading list – have to catch up on ones I missed in January and February and then I need to read the next Bridgerton book before the new series comes out!
I am hoping to still be able to find time for reading more this next month even as I continue to work a lot. Happy reading!
Title: How to Love Your Neighbor Author: Sophie Sullivan Date finished: 2/4/22 Genre: Contemporary romance Publisher: St. Martin’s Griffin Publication Date: January 18, 2022 Pages in book: 345 Stand alone or series: Stand alone Where I got the book from:NetGalley NOTE: I received this book for free from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. This in no way affected my opinion of the book, or the content of my review.
Blurb from the cover:
Enemies-to-lovers meets HGTV in this frothy, effervescent romantic comedy from Sophie Sullivan, author of Ten Rules for Faking It.
Interior Design School? Check. Cute house to fix up? Check.
Sexy, grumpy neighbor who is going to get in the way of your plans? Check. Unfortunately.
Grace Travis has it all figured out. In between finishing school and working a million odd jobs, she’ll get her degree and her dream job. Most importantly, she’ll have a place to belong, something her harsh mother could never make. When an opportunity to fix up—and live in—a little house on the beach comes along, Grace is all in. Until her biggest roadblock moves in next door.
Noah Jansen knows how to make a deal. As a real estate developer, he knows when he’s found something special. Something he could even call home. Provided he can expand by taking over the house next door–the house with the combative and beautiful woman living in it.
With the rules for being neighborly going out the window, Grace and Noah are in an all-out feud. But sometimes, your nemesis can show you that home is always where the heart is.
My rating: 2.0 stars out of a scale of 5
My review: I was provided a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest and fair review.
I was really interested in the description of this book – I’m a fan of the enemies to lovers trope so I was excited to give this one a read. This book ended up just not being for me though. I’m sure that many other people will (and do!) love this book I just can’t say I was one of them. The hero was an ass right from the start and I never really felt like he ever turned into a likeable character for me. And the heroine was just not someone I could connect with either – it’s hard for me to really pinpoint exactly why, but I never enjoyed her character. So while the concept was promising and there was a decent plot involved, this book just didn’t end up working for me. I would still recommend giving it a try – there are a lot of people who did enjoy the book so there’s something redeemable in there I’m sure!
Click on the cover to go to the book’s Amazon page
And so we begin another new year! 2022 is already a headache for me – January itself was busy as I try to get used to working a lot of hours with a baby at home. And to close out 2022 everyone in the house has come down with COVID. Being sick during busy season is always tough for me and I’m struggling to get my hours back up to where they need to be. All that to say – January wasn’t my most stellar of reading months! But here is my reading progress for January:
Hook, Line and Sinker by Tessa Bailey (VERY EXCITED)
I am hoping to still be able to find time for reading during the next couple months even though I’ll be in the trenches of busy season. Even if I only am able to eke out small amounts of time for reading I’m looking forward to some great reads this month! Happy reading!
2021 was such an eventful year for us! My husband and I welcomed a little baby boy in July and he has been such a joy for us. I had a few months of maternity leave during which I actually got a LOT of reading done. I had gallbladder surgery and then went back to work right in the midst of a busy season so had to dive right into things. We were so blessed this year and it’s hard to believe how much of our life has changed.
So anyways! On to the meat of this post – to recap on the goals list that I had set for 2021:
Participate in certain reading challenges:
Bout of Books Challenge – BOB 31 (May 2021) – Did not participate in this challenge, was very busy with work and the last few months of pregnancy
Book Bingo challenges! I’d like to participate in at least one bingo challenge again this year. Maybe the Ripped Bodice summer bingo but I’ll be busy in July and August so I’m not sure if that’ll work. We’ll see how things pan out but I do so much enjoy those so I’d like to participate in at least one. – I did the Ripped Bodice summer romance reading bingo, I was off for two months in the summer and it was fun!
Keep reading my backlog list! At least one book per month – I was definitely able to accomplish this, I actually read 26 books of my backlog which I was super happy about. I still have 42 books to get through so I have to stick with it !
Keep reading from my personal library! At least one book per month – I did this one too! I might’ve even gotten through more than one a month a couple times, but I also bought more new books in 2021 than I read from my library so have not yet been able to deplete my library at all
Write at least one non-review and non-blog tour post a month – can be one of the structured posts like Top Ten Tuesday or it can be informative or whatever I feel like! – I did this for January, February, March, and April and then I kind of lost track of it. I had a great time writing the posts that I did get out though, especially the Girl Scout Cookie, wine and book pairing post I did in March.
This year was very different for me since we added a new family member. My maternity leave included a lot more reading than I ever would have expected but those late night feedings it’s so easy to read on a Kindle!
In looking back on my year of reading this year, I was able to read a comparable amount related to previous years. Below is a chart of the books I read by month this year vs previous years:
I also really like the functionality of the Goodreads Year in Books summary for giving an overview of what happened during my year for reading. I don’t record 100% of the books I read on here so it doesn’t always match up with my own figures but I love having all the covers in one place, it makes for a neat graphic.
And just for fun! Here are a few of my favorites from 2021:
Favorite Reads from2021
The Hating Game by Sally Thorne – 5.0 stars – Also I watched the movie and I really liked it! There were pros and cons to it but overall I think it stayed really true to the book and it is definitely enjoyable
Last year’s best new author was Tessa Bailey and, even though she wasn’t a new author to me in 2021, I feel like I still have to mention her since I’ve been just gobbling up her backlog. I love a lot of the books I’ve read by her. But best new author I read in 2021 is a tie between Emily Henry (loved Beach Read!) and Nikki Sloane (who I heard about on the Fated Mates podcast).
Here we close out the 2021 year and we look ahead to the New Year!!
Happy New Year!
Looking ahead to 2022, I feel so grateful for all the ways my life has grown this past year. Some of those things will take away from my reading and blogging time and that’s an adjustment I’ve been getting used to over the last few months. Reading is still very important to me so I want to make time for it where I can, but many of my 2022 goals are going to be personal goals for outside the blog. That being said, there are some reading goals that I’m still hoping to achieve.
Looking ahead to 2022, here are some of the goals I plan to work on:
Participate in certain reading challenges: Book Bingo challenges! I’d like to participate in at least one bingo challenge again this year. Maybe the Ripped Bodice summer bingo since I’ve done that one the last couple years and have enjoyed it.
Keep reading my backlog list! At least one book per month
Keep reading from my personal library! At least one book per month
Write at least four non-review and non-blog tour post during the year – can be one of the structured posts like Top Ten Tuesday or it can be informative or whatever I feel like! I wasn’t able to keep up with the one a month schedule this past year so I’m hoping doing just four during the whole year will be more manageable.
I wish everyone love and joy in 2022, Happy Reading!
December went by in a flash. Between Thanksgiving last month and the holidays at the end of December, plus all the work to get done before the 12/31 deadline, it was a hectic month! The holidays were so wonderful, it was great to see our son’s first Christmas experience – even though he’s still too young to really know what’s going on. I didn’t have as much time as I had hoped to read over my “vacation” time but I did get some reading done. And I watched the new Hating Game movie, I thought it was pretty good! Here is my reading progress for December:
I’ll be posting a summary of my year sometime in the next couple days – I always like looking back at the past year and thinkin about what I want to accomplish over the next year. Hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Happy reading!
November was such a busy month. Work has been steadily ramping up for me over the last month and I’m trying to really push through before the holidays and get everything done. Thanksgiving was a great celebration this year and we had so much to be thankful for. I didn’t get to read a ton this month but I have been enjoying the books I’ve been reading. Here is my reading progress for November:
I do have one schedule read for next month – its part of the Harlequin Dreamer series blog tour! Stay tuned for more details.
Other than that I am hoping to catch up on books for my Fated Mates podcast that I follow. They’re already into Season 4 and I am still reading along with Season 2 so I have a lot of catching up to do!
I always love doing my year end summary posts, looking forward to those later this month. Hope everyone has a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! Happy reading!
My favorite time of the year is almost over! Fall is the best – between the cooler weather and my birthday and all the Halloween decorations, I just love this time of year. We always have a big Halloween celebration and it’s just great. And this year we got to make lots of new memories with our son. I started back at work and it’s been hard at times trying to find a balance between work and home – this resulted in October being a slow reading month for me! Here is my reading progress for October:
BUT I just have to mention – I made it onto one of my favorite podcasts FATED MATES!! I called in and left a voicemail to talk about the book that “blooded me” and they used my recording to conclude one of their episodes! I literally screamed in the car when I heard it, I was so excited!! It’s episode 27 of Season 2 and was an interstitial about sickbed scenes on romance novels. I HIGHLY recommend listening to the whole episode because it was a good one but if you’re looking to hear from me specifically, my message starts at minute 29:00!
Favorite books from this month:
Nothing really that stood out this month
Next Month TBR List:
Nothing on the TBR for next month, which is good because work is just so busy right now and I’m going to have trouble keeping up between my work load and a baby at home. I’m hoping to fit in time for reading when I can and just read stuff from my backlog or my library. I’ve also started going to clients and to the office again and have been listening to my podcasts! So hopefully I can read some books this month for catching up with the podcast TBR.
Happy November to everyone and enjoy Thanksgiving (safely)!
My favorite time of the year is here. Fall is the best – between the cooler weather and my birthday and all the Halloween decorations, I just love this time of year. This past month was my last month of maternity leave and I read A LOT! I won’t be able to continue at this pace going forward as I’m starting back at work but I am hoping to still read some great books next month too. So! Here is my reading progress for September:
Beach Read by Emily Henry – 4.75 stars
It Happened One Summer by Tessa Bailey – 4.5 stars
Next Month TBR List:
For October, I don’t have any scheduled reads but I wanted to do some spooky/witchy reads! So I’m going to be reading a mix of things from my backlog and my library that fit into my “theme” for this month:
The Ex Hex
Witches of East End
Witches of Eastwick
Sorrow
Look for Me
The Witchfinder’s Sister
The Vanishing Season
A Heart of Blood and Ashes
I’m back to work this month but hoping to ease in slowly so I just need to find a balance between work and family first and then I’ll be able to figure out where I can fit in more reading!
Happy reading everyone and hope you all have a spooky October!
What a great month August was! I have been spending lots of time with my new baby at home and have been reading A LOT. Plus we’ve been getting out and starting to do things as a family, like going to events and a local country fair. It’s been so exciting to go on adventures as a new family of three! During all this I read some awesome books, so here is my reading progress for August:
September is one of my favorite months of the year, and this year especially I have a lot to look forward to! My mom and I both have our birthdays in September and we have a series of events planned. And with the new addition to our family this year we have even more to celebrate! I will still be on leave for the next month so there will continue to be some additional time for reading. I’ve been making great headway with my backlogs from prior years and I’ll hopefully continue to make progress with this.
Rebeccabookreview 