Reading Life Review: June 2020

June 29, 2020

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It’s a long one today, so hang with us dear readers, but it includes a lengthy list, so that helps!

Data: If you haven’t completed our reader poll, it is still open and we’d love to hear from you! If you’re reading this, your opinion matters! If you love data, please give us some of that love! Thanks to our dear readers who’ve already completed it.

Read with us, work with us: At the beginning of this month, we mentioned we had just thrown out the reading plan and the posting plan for the month and were going to mostly make it up as we went along, and we did. So much so that we mentioned that we were considering reading Me and White Supremacy: Combat Racism, Change the World, and Become a Good Ancestor by Layla F. Saad. Spoiler alert. We didn’t. We didn’t read enough to know this title is meant to be a 28-day workbook, not a title that can be read in a few days and processed shortly thereafter, as is our habit. So, dear readers, we’re digging into DAY ONE with this title today and we invite you to join us on this journey. You can join knowing that we’re all doing it, or if there is interest, we can create a private Facebook group for those interested. If you’re interested, let us know in the comments (or you can DM us). For those who use the electronic library, Overdrive is making this title available for free, without a wait.

Virtual Book Club Part Trois is coming to a screen near you on Friday, August 7 at 7:30 p.m. CST. We’ll be discussing The Care and Feeding of Ravenously Hungry Girls by Anissa Gray. The Kindle edition of title is on sale now for $1.99! If you’re interested, registration is open here.

Ashley IN MEDIAS RES

Nikki IN MEDIAS RES

Ashley FIN

Nikki FIN

Just like making lemonade out of lemons isn’t the easiest thing to do, but is totally worth all of the effort, so has been pitching our reading and posting plans for June (mostly) and digging into the joys and discomforts the last month have brought. We did not abandon our plan to read Bluewater Billionaire backlist, as we do believe in balance and self-care, and they have balanced some uncomfortable, but important titles, and probably will continue to do so for the next month (thank you special Kindle Unlimited offer as we were about to cancel on Friday).

Unlike past months most of the books we brought to the blog this month we read this month (and some of the others we read this month, we are planning or hoping to bring). As much as I appreciate you all being kept up to date with our reading lives, it’s stressful and we’re moving towards a plan that will give us a bit more wiggle room because I don’t like finishing a title and having mere days to get my thoughts ready to post to the big, wide internets. As such, I don’t have a lot more to say about this month’s titles. Open door romance novels were great pauses while reading more serious titles. Romance may not be for everyone, but I highly encourage readers to find a genre that feels like a big pause with a breath of relaxed air because there are times when you need just that. It’s different than coming back to an old favorite (which feels more like an amazing hug), but honestly, romance novels are that for me, regardless of the details, or lack thereof, because I know the formula, so I’m expecting some sort of a problem to happen about two-thirds of the way in, and I know how it’s going to end, and even if I want more of an epilogue, it’s going to be a happy ending.

I do want to mention a few things about this month’s titles:

Special thanks to Kathryn Nolan for recommending Just Right by Bronwyn Green. I think I can speak for us both when I say it was a delightful novella and we’ll be looking out for more from Ms. Green.
Also a shout out to Mrs. Nolan for her Codex books (Behind the Veil, Under the Rose, and In the Clear – no release date yet, but it’s coming soon and I’m SO excited to read more from Codex, especially Abe, everyone’s favorite silverfox). I adore the intersection of romance, espionage, art, and science (think Copernicus y’all).
Dear Claire Kingsley and Lucy Score, when can we go to Bootleg Springs and hang with your amazing characters? We can leave in 20 minutes if Scarlett can fit us in one of her rental houses! Also, can Nadine Tucker teach us all of her ways? Love, Us

Since it’s almost July, I also wanted to check in on our reading goals, at least so far.

Read an average of at least one non-fiction book per month, preferably two.
I did not manage a nonfiction title in March, but I finished one in February, two in January, April, and May, and four in June. That’s a total of 11, so I’m calling it a win! The average is 1.8, so with a little planning, it’ll be 2+ by the end of the year!

Read a total of 104 books this year.
As of this typing, I’ve read 72 books this year. That is an estimate because I have two box sets on my “currently reading” shelf, but it also counts novellas and a short story or two, so it’s probably pretty close (and is my official count as I do not write down my titles *cough* *Ashley*). According to the Goodreads Reading Challenge, that’s 21 books ahead of schedule. I was only slightly (2-4) books ahead of schedule in March, so I’m blaming 2020 and moving ahead.

Rate and review each title I read.
I have rated each title, but I have not reviewed. I’ve been writing a lot here, so I haven’t been writing reviews. I think (I didn’t check) I was doing better before March hit and the balls of stress started rolling into one another and I decided that, while reviews are very important, I needed to let that goal go for the time being, at the least.

How’s the holds sit-e-ation?:
At present, I have 72 holds, and I have gotten several titles off my holds list in recent weeks, and have plans for a few more in the near future. I don’t think I’ll be back down to the 62 I was at in March until several weeks after I cancel my Kindle Unlimited subscription, which I anticipate doing in August, if I can get some time with dear Harry this month. I do have two titles that have been on the holds list just over a year (as of June), which is not my preference, but we threw out June’s reading plan so I’m rolling with it for now. July will only add one new one, and two more in August, so that’ll be five titles total, which is very do-able to catch up on in a couple of months. The only question is what will be added between now and then.

How are you doing on your reading goals? What’s still working? What have you edited in the pursuit of self-care?

~Nikki

Let’s start with our regularly scheduled Reading Life Review.

As Nikki and I have discussed with you several times this month, our normal plans – plans which make our personality types very happy – were re-written and scrapped several times, to where we’ve been winging our posts in a slightly uncomfortable manner. I decided to organize my Reading Life Plan of Attack this month every Sunday when I sat down to organize my week. It’s been a great balm that I have lots of little check marks on those colorful sticker circles rather than a bunch of unchecked circles. Of course, some of the books get added in when they are read, like the hat trick of hockey books I completed this month, thank you Samantha Whiskey. (Honestly, I’ll probably have four Carolina Reapers books completed by the end of the day today, but as of right now it’s three so I’m running with the hat trick metaphor. Don’t get at me.) A lovely treat that I have just realized I will be huddled up with are the BRAND NEW Raleigh Raptor books just released in April and June! Praise the Lord Ms. Whiskey has added my second favorite sport to her series repertoire, but I’m always here for more hockey boys.

As for the other titles, most of those which are not firmly covered in the Romance genre, there was one I stayed up all night reading and writing about, and we’ll be bringing that title to you in July. I finished our second Virtual Book Club title mere hours before we were set to discuss it, and I’m impressed at my ability to continually push the boundaries of timelines as that is not the #enneagram1 way.

Now, RAISE YOUR HAND IF YOU ARE CRUSHING YOUR 2020 READING GOALS.

If you remember from December, I had a 4-pronged plan of attack so let’s see how I’m progressing…

Read 100 books in 2020
According to GoodReads I am at 67 books completed, which is 18 books ahead of schedule as of this writing. Whoops? If I keep at the rate I have been going the past two months, which is approximately 15 titles a month, I’ll be set to hit 150 by the end of the year. I don’t like raising my goal in the middle of trying to attain it, or even after I’ve accomplished it, because what I really enjoy is seeing by how much I can CRUSH IT. I want to make that GoodReads Reading Challenge ticker cry in agony at the percentage over my goal I have accomplished. Being More not Less in all things.

Keep up with tracking on GoodReads and on paper
I’m always excited about our end of month reading life review because I get to share photos of my planner where I keep track of all the things. I’ve been thinking about my process a lot and even though I’m going to continue tracking this same way for the rest of the year, I have some ideas percolating for 2021. May and June have been difficult on my 2020 Reading Log spread because I’ve read more books than I have lines for each month. As my sticker says: I didn’t plan for this. I’ll be recovering from this not looking perfect all year. #enneagram1

Read one non-fiction title a month
Yeah, I didn’t think I needed to worry about this with my non-fiction habit, but I missed both January and March. I did finish an average of 2.6 books a month because I did read 16 total so far this year. I need to be a little more intentional with my non-fiction, but I also read A BUNCH TON about the state of the real estate market and do quite a bit of continuing education reading that’s not a book title. All about that #RealtorLife, y’all.

DNF more instead of struggling through
I wrote an entire blog post on why we should DNF. Though, complaining about how terrible a book is on the internet for everyone to read is also satisfying. I have not DNF’d a book yet this year and I struggled to get through several. And readers, for the record, struggling in this context isn’t the same as reading something emotionally heavy, though something can be a struggle because it is emotionally heavy. That wasn’t the case with my books this year, so here’s to hoping none of our other titles this year are a strugglebus.

What’s not a strugglebus? This hockey romance novel I’m reading right now… byeeeee!

~Ashley

Related Posts

Reading Life Review: August 2020

Reading Life Review: July 2020

Reader Poll and Virtual Book Club Updates

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