Tag Archives: reading challenge

2019 Book #63 – Conversations with the Fat Girl by Liza Palmer

Posted in 2019, ARC August 2019, Book reviews, Fiction, Reading Challenges, Women's fiction by

41EO-wfyVJLTitle: Conversations with the Fat Girl
Author: Liza Palmer
Date finished: 8/21/19
Genre: Fiction, women’s fiction
Publisher: Forever
Publication Date: September 3, 2007 – Reprinted in 2019
Pages in book: 319
Stand alone or series: Stand alone
Where I got the book from: Publisher/Author
NOTE: I received this book for free from the publisher/author 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:

Liza Palmer will have readers cheering as she explores friendship, true love, and self-acceptance in this “engaging and poignant” (Jennifer Weiner) novel. 
Everyone seems to be getting on with their lives except Maggie. At twenty-seven, she’s still serving coffee at Joe’s while her friends are getting married, having babies, and thriving in their careers. And now Olivia, Maggie’s best friend since grade school, is getting married too. The man in Maggie’s life? Well there isn’t one, except the guy she has a crush on, Domenic, who works with her at the coffee shop. Oh, and her dog, Solo (the name says it all).
When Olivia comes to town and asks Maggie to be her maid of honor, Maggie is thrilled… but she can’t help comparing herself to the new and “improved” Olivia. Way back then, they befriended each other because they both struggled with their weight. Now grown up, Maggie is still shopping in the “women’s section” while Olivia went and had gastric-bypass surgery in search of the elusive size 2. But as the wedding nears, Olivia’s seemingly perfect life starts to unravel, and Maggie realizes that happiness might not be tied to a number on the scale.
In this wonderful novel, Liza Palmer is both witty and wise, giving a voice to women everywhere who have ever wished they could stop obsessing… and start living.

My rating:  2.5 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 finished this book for ARC August 2019! Love this reading challenge. And this year I’m especially excited because this year they have a bunch of fun games and challenges, including one of my favorite things, reading bingo! This book will be checking off my “Free Space” box since I just didn’t know what to pick.

I was interested in the premise of this book after reading about it. I’ve struggled with weight issues during most of my life and after reading Kristan Higgins’ Good Luck With That last year I was hopeful that this book would give me similar feelings of connection and understanding. I didn’t end up feeling quite as connected to this book as I had hoped but I still enjoyed it. Even though I struggled with body-image issues due to my weight, I never once struggled with my self-worth. I am so thankful for the family of amazing women (and men) who raised me to be proud of who I am and realize how amazing I am as a person. I struggled connecting to the narrator of this book because for the first half (or more) of the book she doesn’t believe in herself at all, and she doesn’t think that her own life is worth standing up for. I found that hard to read as it is immensely sad. Once she was able to start picking herself up and really making strides within her own life I became more interested, but it just took so long to get there. I liked the ending but I struggled to much through the first half to say that I really liked the book – solely based on my personality not being able to connect with the narrator.

Link to author website

Click on the cover to go to the book’s Amazon page

ARC August 2019 – Update #3

Posted in 2019, ARC August 2019, For the love of books, Reading Challenges by

arc-august-2019

And so ARC August continues! I’ve been doing pretty darn well (if I do say so myself) keeping up with my reading schedule this time, I’m hopeful I’ll be able to meet my overall goal this month! Anyways, so here’s where I stand right now:

MY PROGRESS

July & August 2019 ARC’s 

-Never Have I Ever by Joshilyn Jackson
-The Book Charmer by Karen Hawkins – Read & Reviewed – Week 2
-The Arrangement by Robyn Harding – Read & Reviewed – Week 3
-A Highlander Walks Into a Bar by Laura Trentham – Read & Reviewed – Week 1 
-The Perfect Wife by JP Delaney
-The Turn of the Key by Ruth Ware – Read & Reviewed – Week 3
-The Right Swipe by Alisha Rai – Read & Reviewed – Week 2
-Outfox by Sandra Brown
-To the Stars and Back by Camilla Isley – Read & Reviewed – Week 2

Additions to the list: 

– Conversations with a Fat Girl by Liza Palmer
– As Good as the First Time by K. M. Jackson – Read & Reviewed – Week 3

Books Read August 11th – 17th

Plan for Upcoming Week

The upcoming week is a very busy week for me! Every year my family and I work at the Terryville Fair over the whole weekend while the Fair is going on, which takes up a good amount of reading time during the weekend. Also this year my husband and I are going to see Ron White on Saturday night (exciting!). Hoping to find some time here and there to keep up with the great progress I’ve made so far, but also looking forward to one of my favorite events of the year! Happy reading everyone!

2019 Book #61 – As Good as the First Time by K.M. Jackson

Posted in 2019, ARC August 2019, Book Genre, Book reviews, Contemporary romance, Fiction, Reading Challenges, Romance by

51Te9w5usZLTitle: As Good as the First Time
Author: K.M. Jackson
Date finished: 8/15/19
Genre: Contemporary romance
Publisher: Dafina
Publication Date: October 30, 2018
Pages in book: 336
Stand alone or series: #1 in the Sugar Lake series
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:

True to its name, the small southern town of Sugar Lake is a sweet place to visit—and you might even want to live there . . .

With her big-city career and relationship in sudden free fall, Olivia Gale isn’t sure where she belongs. So when her help is needed at Goode ‘N Sweet, the family bakery in Sugar Lake, she jumps at the chance to indulge her pie-making hobby while getting her life back on track. Olivia’s not looking for any distractions. Even if the boy who once left her without a word is now a grown man with intriguing secrets—and the same tempting hold on her heart . . .

A firefighter and single dad, Clayton Morris is trying hard to fix his past mistakes. He thought he was doing the right thing by leaving Olivia—and now he’s sure he has nothing to offer the accomplished woman she’s become. But ignoring the sparks between them is impossible. And as unexpected surprises and hard choices endanger their fragile reunion, they’ll have to decide which direction to take if they want to find the road back to love . . .

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 finished this book for ARC August 2019! Love this reading challenge. And this year I’m especially excited because this year they have a bunch of fun games and challenges, including one of my favorite things, reading bingo! This book will be checking off my “Finish 1 2018 release” box since I should’ve read this one last year! And since this is from my prior years backlog, I also read this as part of my Bookish 2019 Reading Challenge: 52 Ways to Kill Your TBR checking off line #11 – a novel that includes a recipe.

I had read a couple chapters of this book in last year’s Buzz Books Romance collection and was intrigued by them. So I figured I’d check out the full book! And as much as I was interested in the book based on the couple chapters I read, the book overall fell kind of flat for me. I didn’t find that there was enough meaningful interaction between Clayton and Olivia for me personally. They spent a lot of the book not only resisting each other but also not communicating well and not having the type of important conversations that I would look for with character and relationship development. And not just with the two main characters, I also thought that Olivia and her sister Drea’s relationship could have been developed more. I think that a lot of the issues I had with the book though were just based on personal preference and what I enjoy with my reading. Overall the book was entertaining and the characters were interesting, this one just wasn’t quite the book for me. I’d still recommend it if you like a sweet, small town romance (almost all closed door romance) with zany characters and a second chance romance, I’d recommend this one.

Link to author website

Click on the cover to go to the book’s Amazon page

ARC August 2019 – Update #2

Posted in 2019, ARC August 2019, Reading Challenges by

arc-august-2019

First full week of ARC August I would consider a smashing success! . Anyways, so here’s where I stand right now:

MY PROGRESS

July & August 2019 ARC’s 

-Never Have I Ever by Joshilyn Jackson
-The Book Charmer by Karen Hawkins – Read & Reviewed – Week 2
-The Arrangement by Robyn Harding
-A Highlander Walks Into a Bar by Laura Trentham – Read & Reviewed – Week 1 
-The Perfect Wife by JP Delaney
-The Turn of the Key by Ruth Ware
-The Right Swipe by Alisha Rai – Read & Reviewed – Week 2
-Outfox by Sandra Brown
-To the Stars and Back by Camilla Isley – Read & Reviewed – Week 2

Additions to the list: 

– Conversations with a Fat Girl by Liza Palmer

Books Read August 4th – 10th

Plan for Upcoming Week

I’m pretty slammed at work right now but so far I’ve been able to balance between work and also finding time to read. Hoping to have that continue to work this week! And not many plans over the next weekend so there will be plenty of time for reading. Happy reading everyone!

ARC August 2019 – Update #1

Posted in 2019, ARC August 2019, Reading Challenges by

arc-august-2019The first few days of ARC August 2019 were pretty successful! I got some good reading done on vacation and then also at home while I prepare to dive back into my work day tomorrow. Anyways, so here’s where I stand right now:

MY PROGRESS

July & August 2019 ARC’s 

-Never Have I Ever by Joshilyn Jackson
-The Book Charmer by Karen Hawkins
-The Arrangement by Robyn Harding
-A Highlander Walks Into a Bar by Laura Trentham – Read Week 1 – Review to be posted
-The Perfect Wife by JP Delaney
-The Turn of the Key by Ruth Ware
-The Right Swipe by Alisha Rai
-Outfox by Sandra Brown
-To the Stars and Back by Camilla Isley

Books Read August 1st – 3rd

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A Highlander Walks Into a Bar by Laura Trentham – 3.5 stars – Review to be posted soon!

Plan for Upcoming Week

This week is going to be hectic, that’s for sure. I was off all last week for vacation so I’ll have a lot to catch up on at work. I’m just going to try and push through and keep at it – I’ve so far been mostly successful at balancing my productivity between work and reading and other over the last month so I’m hoping I can keep balancing and keep reading a lot this month! Happy reading everyone!

ARC August 2019 Reading Challenge Sign Up Post

Posted in 2019, ARC August 2019, For the love of books, Reading Challenges by

arc-august-2019

Woo Hoo! ARC August is here again, and I can’t wait to dig into some of my backlog and my upcoming releases. I still have wayyyyy too many ARC’s from the past three years that I never got a chance to read, plus I missed the “deadline” for 12 additional ARCs so far in 2019. PLUS I have 6 ARCs scheduled to be read in August. SO you could say I have a lot of reading to accomplish! For those of you that don’t know, ARC August is a month-long reading challenge hosted by Read.Sleep.Repeat. and the only participation requirement is reading ARC’s! I participated in this reading challenge for the last four years (2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018), and every year this reading challenge has been super successful and productive. I hope to continue the productivity with this challenge this year since I have so much to read! I’ll be on a family vacation during the first few days of August and should be able to get a jump start on my reading for the month!

So here is the list I’m going to be working off of for this year’s challenge:

July & August 2019 ARC’s 

-Never Have I Ever by Joshilyn Jackson
-The Book Charmer by Karen Hawkins
-The Arrangement by Robyn Harding
-A Highlander Walks Into a Bar by Laura Trentham
-The Perfect Wife by JP Delaney
-The Turn of the Key by Ruth Ware
-The Right Swipe by Alisha Rai
-Outfox by Sandra Brown
-To the Stars and Back by Camilla Isley

I’m hoping to also possibly get to some backlog ARC’s from previous years, but I’m in the midst of a series right now so between that and the ARC’s I might not be able to make it to previous years’ backlogs. I’m looking forward to a lot of the books I have lined up for August though – I can’t wait to get to reading!

Bout of Books 25 Update – Day 7 & Wrap Up

Posted in 2019, Bout of Books 25, For the love of books, Reading Challenges by

oJKtz8s

So for one of my goals this year to help me focus more on reading and having concentrated time for reading, I decided to participate in two of the three Bout of Books reading challenges / read-a-thons this year! This was the second one for this year, with the first being in January. I was actually super successful over the last week with setting aside time for reading and I was able to get a lot done!

First let’s do my Day 7 (Sunday) update on reading.

Update

Sunday

Time spent reading: (Approximately) 3 hours
Number of pages I’ve read today: 212 pages
Total number of pages I’ve read: 1,375 pages
Books read: Continued reading My Favorite Half-Night Stand
Challenges: I did not do the challenge post for today

And now let’s look at how I fared for my overall Bout of Books 25 wrap up:

Time Devoted to Reading

I plan to read at least 1.5 hours each day during the week, with hopefully additional hours on Saturday and Sunday. Monday I’ll be at the spa with my Mom for Mother’s Day but hopefully can find time to read during the day while we’re there.
I met the daily reading goal 5 out of the 7 days. Tuesday I had to work too late and then Friday I had a bunch of other things I was getting done plus dinner out with family! I read extra some of the other days though so I made up for it. Overall I read over 20 hours for the challenge!

My Goals

My goals for this read-a-thon are that I’d like to participate in as much as I can: the daily posts plus reading every day. I’d really like to just focus on getting back into reading. My traditional busy season at work goes from January to April and it was a killer this year. I gave up on reading for April since all I was doing was making myself more tired. I’ve just recently picked up reading again and it’s been going well but I need to get back on board with my reading schedule in a big way.

I was able to read every day! Which was a big deal for me – I didn’t read hardly anything in April. I only participated in one of the daily challenges but I did that so I could concentrate more on reading! 

Books to Read

  • Read The Bride Test by Helen Hoang Finished and reviewed!
  • Read The Unhoneymooners by Christina Lauren Finished and reviewed!
  • Read Next Girl to Die by Dea Poirier Finished and reviewed! 
  • Read a book for my Bookish Reading Challenge Started and got almost all the way through – review to come soon for My Favorite Half-Night Stand by Christina Lauren
  • Read The Suspect by Fiona Burton Did not get to

 

Overall I thought I did super well with this challenge and made a lot of time for reading! I’m looking forward to participating in a Bookish Bingo challenge next month and hopefully get lots more reading done!

Bout of Books 25 Update – Day 6

Posted in 2019, Bout of Books 25, For the love of books, Reading Challenges by

oJKtz8s

Posting this a day late since we were too busy having tons of fun this weekend! Saturday was goal day so I got a lot of reading done and it was great! It was the perfect relaxing day spent with my Mom and also dinner with the family. So anyways my Saturday’s progress is below:

Update

Saturday

Time spent reading: (Approximately) 7 hours
Number of pages I’ve read today: 372 pages
Total number of pages I’ve read: 1,163 pages
Books read: Continued reading Next Girl to Die and started My Favorite Half-Night Stand
Challenges: I did not participate in the challenge for yesterday – I focused on reading for the day!

Stay tuned for continued progress made in my next post on my Sunday update!!

Bout of Books 25 Update – Day 5

Posted in 2019, Bout of Books 25, Reading Challenges by

oJKtz8s

Yesterday I read a little in the afternoon while getting my car serviced but we went out to dinner with family so I didn’t get to read much at night. So anyways my Friday’s progress is below:

Update

Friday

Time spent reading: (Approximately) 1 hour
Number of pages I’ve read today: 55 pages
Total number of pages I’ve read: 791 pages
Books read: Continued reading Next Girl to Die
Challenges: I did not participate in the challenge for yesterday – the day just flew by and there wasn’t enough time

Stay tuned for continued progress made in tomorrow’s post on my Saturday update!!

Bout of Books 25 Update – Day 4

Posted in 2019, Bout of Books 25, For the love of books, Reading Challenges by

oJKtz8s

This week is going well so far! I didn’t get to meet my hours goal every day so far but have been for the most part and am getting some good reading done. And looking forward to Goal Day tomorrow for lots of concentrated reading time! So anyways my Thursday’s progress is below:

Update

Thursday

Time spent reading: (Approximately) 1.5 hour
Number of pages I’ve read today: 142 pages
Total number of pages I’ve read: 736 pages
Books read: Finished The Unhoneymooners by Christina Lauren (Hopefully will have the review post up sometime this weekend)
Challenges: I participated in the challenge yesterday, If You Like This, Try That – it was fun!!

Stay tuned for continued progress made in tomorrow’s post on my Friday update!!