5 Bookish Things I’ve Changed My Mind About

My bookish habits have gone through a fair amount of change these past few years, largely due to the blogosphere.

Sometime between scrolling through all the book blogs and seeing many similar-themed posts, my brain reached a tipping point and was rewired to think more like the rest of the blogging community (🐑 <— me, a sheep). There were some bookish things that I refused to accept until you all, without meaning to, knocked some sense into me. Here are five bookish things I’ve changed my mind about (thanks to you all 🥂!):

Continue reading →

The Zodiac Challenge Tag

**A few weeks ago, I was tagged by Hannah at But First, Fiction in the Zodiac Challenge (thank you! 💕).**

I learned that she’s long overdue for a re-watch of The Emperor’s New Groove and The Princess and the Frog ~~(which, let’s be honest, we all are)~~. Also, she taught me that there’s a word for sidekick?!

𝓓𝓮𝓾𝓽𝓮𝓻𝓪𝓰𝓸𝓷𝓲𝓼𝓽 is a thing, everyone.

It’s hard for me to get behind zodiacs especially when, as a Virgo, I’m painted as perfectionist—something that’s only true about me in a limited number of cases. ᴡʜɪʟᴇ ɪ ᴀᴍ ᴀɴ ᴀsᴛʀᴏʟᴏɢʏ ᴀɴᴅ ᴢᴏᴅɪᴀᴄ sᴋᴇᴘᴛɪᴄ, I am a Disney fanatic and will gladly take this opportunity to share Disneyish facts about me ᵀᴴᴬᵀ ᵞᴼᵁ ᴾᴿᴼᴮᴬᴮᴸᵞ ᴰᴼᴺ’ᵀ ᴿᴱᴬᴸᴸᵞ ᶜᴬᴿᴱ ᶠᴼᴿ. So, let’s get started!

Continue reading →

My Women’s History Month Read-a-thon // five days of female-authored stories

Mission: read six female-authored stories in five days.

Why: Because, of course, I’ve fallen behind on my annual Goodreads Reading Challenge.

By how many books, you ask?

By six books 🤦‍♀️.

The TBR: We’re just going to wing it this time. I’m a self-proclaimed mood reader anyways.

Wish me luck 😬:

Continue reading →

5 Spring Reads

It’s almost Spring!

Weather wise, it personally doesn’t feel like spring where I am. It’s hot, muggy, oppressive and the only “animals” giving birth in this heat are mosquitoes.

Is it obvious I’m in the tropics?

But seasons aren’t just defined by the change of weather they bring. Seasons can stir feelings and emotions in us—like how summer enacts idleness or winter intensifies our desire for affection. In the case of spring, this season offers us a clean canvas in which we feel like we can start afresh.

I’m ɢʀᴀᴅᴜᴀᴛɪɴɢ from university in a few weeks, so while the weather doesn’t align with the scientific definition of spring, my state of mind and wary eagerness for new beginnings is definitely clinging to the idea of spring.

For this *Top 5 Wednesday, I tried to choose books that inspired me to change in any way or taught me something that I was able to utilize to enhance some part of my life. In retrospect, it seems that self-help books and coming of age stories scream spring to me 🙂: Continue reading “5 Spring Reads” →

The Christmas Stocking Tag

Merry Christmas!

(—or happy holidays if you don’t celebrate Christmas 😊.)

It’s been a minute since I’ve done a tag post, so I was thrilled when Jess from Comfort Reads tagged me in this holiday-themed, Christmas Stocking Tag. If you’re like me and like to choose your reads according to the season, you’ll enjoy this tag because the seven questions essentially translate to seven wintry book recommendations. Thanks for tagging me, Jess 😁!

Continue reading →

My Post-Midyear Freak Out Read-a-thon

I am five books behind my Goodreads Reading Challenge.

It’s a little concerning considering that we’re three-fourths into the year and I’m a self-proclaimed slow reader.

This mess all boils down to how unexpectedly busy this first semester of school has been for me. Thankfully, I have few to no academic-related responsibilities this upcoming week, so I can play catch up on my reading goal for this year—again. I’m *trying* to be extra ambitious (but realistic) this read-a-thon since I don’t know when I’ll get another chance to read for recreation this semester 😢.

THE TBR

A Torch Against the Night by Sabaa Tahir – I’ve been *reading* ~~(I use the term very loosely)~~ this book since the end of July. I can feel myself losing interest in it, but I want to finally see it through because I was really enjoying the series so far. This book is the second book in the fantasy series, An Ember in the Ashes. I don’t want to spoil anything about the book just in case any of you are interested in or are reading the first book. As usual, I linked all the titles of books mentioned in the post to their Goodreads page for those who want to learn more about them 💫.
The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho – This is actually a re-read, and that’s not something I usually do. This book follows an Andalusion shepard, Santiago, as he journeys to the pyramids of Giza in search of a treasure that he feels is calling for him.
Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel – This book has been on my TBR for forever, and I was finally able to pick it up at a book sale last month. From what I understand, this is a science fiction book following five characters and how their lives interconnect through time.
Minority Report by Philip K. Dick – This book is set in a world where the police have a technology that identifies people who will commit a crime before the crime is committed. When the Precrime System pinpoints its creator and police officer, John Anderton, as the next criminal, the whole system is put into question. I picked this book up on a whim at the same book sale as Station Eleven, so I have no expectations.

And with that, let’s begin! Continue reading “My Post-Midyear Freak Out Read-a-thon” →

My First Book Haul

I never thought that I would do a book haul.

It’s largely because I rarely read physical books, and hauls are something I associate with tangible objects (although I know people do book hauls with their ebooks 🙂). However, I visited a giant book sale yesterday and managed to find ✨three✨ books that interested me.

Let me also add that since there were sooo manyyy boooks, I definitely judged them all by their covers, and I judged them HARD.

Since I haven’t post in over a month ~~(school is much more hectic this semester than I expected)~~ and have no spare mental energy to write one of my backed-up reviews ~~(school is also requiring more of my dwindling brain power this semester than I expected)~~, I thought a haul post would suffice. In no particular order, here’s what I picked up:
Continue reading “My First Book Haul” →

The Sunshine Blogger Award

This is a first.

I’ve had my fair share of tags, but none have ever been the award type. I’ve seen this particular award around quite a bit—The Sunshine Blogger Award seems almost like a rite of passage into the bookish community. So, thank you, Book Orbit, for nominating me! She’s relatively new to the blogging scene so do drop by her blog and say “hi” 😊.

Continue reading →

My 24 Hour Read-a-thon

aaAAAAHhhhH!

For the first time this year, I’ve fallen behind on my Goodreads Reading Challenge—and not just by one book, but by two whole books *faints*.

All drama aside though, I need to get back to where I was two months ago when I was three books ahead of my goal. I don’t like playing catch up, especially because I’m already such a slow reader. It’s been a while since I posted, so I thought I’d kill two birds with one stone by //live// blogging my attempt to make some type of progress in my ~~life~~ reading goal. I’m aiming to finally finish The Boy on the Bridge by M.R. Carey and knock out some other book I’ll choose later ~~(spoiler alert: it’s Warcross by Marie Lu)~~ in 24 hours.

(//it technically won’t be live by the time I publish this post, but who’s paying attention?)

THE TBR

The Boy on the Bridge by M.R. Carey – This book is a prequel to The Girl With All the Gifts. It follows a team of scientists and soldiers who travel across a post-apocalyptic Britain in the search for any breakthroughs that can save the crumbling human civilization from the hungry (aka zombie) pandemic.
Warcross by Marie Lu –This book is about teenage hacker, Emika Chen, who is hired by famed video game creator and businessman, Hideo Tanaka, to track down a criminal who poses a threat to his world-renowned virtual reality game, Warcross.

And with that, Let’s begin! Continue reading “My 24 Hour Read-a-thon” →

5 Books I’m Thankful For

Happy (almost) Thanksgiving 😄!

Every book I read is a unique experience. Some of these experiences are memorable for being enlightening and many simply from the joy and comfort they brought to me. There are so many books I’m thankful for, but I managed to pick out only five for this week’s *Top 5 Wednesday:

Continue reading →