Mid-Year Progress (and Freak Out tag)

Hey frands. June is (rapidly, holy shit, omg) coming to an end and so it’s time for a little mid-year checkup on my reading progress!

-shuffles through various documents and websites that I use to track my reading progress- Ahem. So, ok. First off, my goal was to read roughly 110 books this year and I set my actually Goodreads goal at 112. Prior to writing this post, I’ve read 58 books and I am apparently 5 books ahead of schedule. Fantastic!

I am also hoping that 40% of the books I read this year will fall into my dusty bookshelf category (ergo, I’ve owned them for way too friggen long and really need to read them!) So far 21 books have made it into this category which puts me at 37% for the moment, but I obviously need to keep this up.

How about the all the series’ (serieses? I STILL don’t know how to type the plural version of this) I’ve been meaning to finish? I AM TRASH AND HAVEN’T READ A SINGLE BOOK FROM ANY OF THEM.

Lastly is my little GSU (genre switch up – someone PLEASE give me a better name for this) challenge. I gave myself 6 seldom read genres to try out this year and thus far I’ve knocked off 3: Romance, YA contemporary and Humor. I should be able to (remember to) pick up the other 3 books before the year is out.

Oh! I’ve also DNF’d five books at this point in the year. This is more than I’ve DNF’d since starting to document my reading progress in 2011. It’s incredibly liberating. I do try to give each book a fair chance, but I need to work harder on tackling my TBR before it gets a job, starts pitching in on the mortgage and then kicks me out of my own house. I just don’t have time for books I’m  not enjoying!

Now, for a fun Mid-Year Freak Out tag that I found on Julie’s (Pages and Pens) channel!

+ Best book I’ve read so far

This is tough. I can’t pick just one because I can almost never just pick one when it comes to books. But here are my tops: Warbreaker, Piratica, Gone with the Wind, and The Long Way to a Small Angry Planet.

+ Best sequel

I haven’t read many sequels this year, so I’m going with Rat Queens vol 2

+ New release haven’t read yet

Well, like, every new book I’ve bought this year! I honestly don’t even know the release dates of most of the books I buy -ashamed face- Let’s go with The Remnant, third book in the Oversight trilogy which I was super hyped about (and also battled Amazon over). But I need to re-read the whole series because my mind is a sieve and I can’t remember shit anymore.

+ Most anticipated book for second half of the year

So for buying purposes, I’ll say the Wars of Vis trilogy (by my queen, Tanith Lee) that is being re-released in the new Daw editions. I can’t friggen wait to buy those. But I probably won’t actually read them because I am garbage.

For reading, let’s say A Closed and Common Orbit because it just came out this month and I just purchased it before starting to write this post and I will certainly read it ASAP. Also Artemis by Andy Weir!

+ Biggest disappointment

I’m tempted to say the Dark Tower series because it’s not at all what I thought it would be, but I’m also not finished so that doesn’t feel fair (because, you know, I’m always fair about everything I write on here). Furthermore was really disappointing because it was so beautiful and it’s middle grade and sounded very Alice/Narnia/Oz inspired so I thought I would love it and instead I really couldn’t stand it. Also, it was a gift and I felt bad for not enjoying it.

+ Biggest surprise of the year

I have a few (duh). Warbreaker – not to say I didn’t think I’d enjoy it but I had no idea just how much I’d love it (enough for all those italics, apparently). I really want to read it again. Mindblowingly fantastic fantasy. Gone with the Wind, Bridge to Terabithia, The Serpent King and Bad Monkeys were also surprisingly more enjoyable and engrossing than I imagined.

+ New to me author I fell in love with

Brandon Sanderson! No, I haven’t started Mistborn yet, but I still love his work after one book.  Also thinking I’m really going to be into Fran Wilde once I read the full-length novel of hers I own. Becky Chambers for sure. Jeff Zentner too!

+ Newest fictional crush

There aren’t a lot of fictional dudes (or ladies) I crush on. I actually hate when I see those memes and products that say the only good men are fictional or book boyfriends are better than real boyfriends and all that garbage.  But Mr. Nobley from Austenland is pretty charming (way more charming than Mr. Darcy) and Suhail from the Lady Trent memoirs is very dashing and open minded.

+ Newest favorite character

VASHER. Runner up is Oy. Runner, runner up is Lovey (shit, or maybe Sissix?!)

+ Book made me cry

I kind of wanted to cry after the sheer exhaustion and emotional undertaking that was reading GWTW, but I didn’t actually. Certainly cried over The Serpent King and Armstrong & Charlie had me teary eyed. I kind of also wanted to cry when Warbreaker was over because it was over and I needed more and there’s no more and oh, gourd, what do I do now!?

+ Book that makes me happy

Well, I mean, all books that I enjoy make me happy – simply owning oodles of books makes me happy. Austenland has definitely become a comfort read (and watch because omg that movie is too cute!) Can I mention Warbreaker again? No? Too soon? What about Angry Planet? Also too soon?!

+ Most beautiful book I’ve bought

The most beautiful book I’ve received this year was actually East of the Sun and West of the Moon (Kay Nielsen) which was a gift. But all of the Daw Tanith reprints I’ve purchased this year are fucking gorgeous. The Warren the 13^th sequel is awesome too. I am looking through my LibraryThing account and noticing lots of lovely books and then said to myself “shit, I bought Riverkeep? When?” and that is a beautiful book too, sooooooo…..

+ Books I need to read before the end of the year

Hi, yes, every book I own.

+ Favorite book community member

It seems mean to choose favorites. But I, of course, love Chelsea and I also love Jacob and Reginy and Nicole. I’ve met them all on Instagram (and Chelsea in person!) and we’ve gone from just chatting about books to sharing our actual lives. They’re people I count as friends in my life, versus just members of an online community I socialize with. Awww.

~

Well, that was fun. If you’ve done this tag on your blog or youtube channel, let me know so I can see what we have in common! Or get more book recs, cuz, ya know, I need them!