July Wrap Up

How is it time for my July wrap up already? While July didn’t feel particularly busy, it feels like there have been so many other, unplanned things going on that, once again, time has completely passed me by.

Books read:

• Bonny & Read – Julie Walker
• Lore Olympus Vol. 2 – Rachel Smythe
• City of Lies – Sam Hawke
• Hollow Empire – Sam Hawke
• The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches – Sangu Mandanna
• The Jasmine Throne – Tasha Suri
• Half A Soul – Olivia Atwater

July wasn’t my best month reading-wise, but I really don’t mind! April through to June were very intense reading months, in which I managed to read into the double figures. It was actually quite nice to go back to my “average” number of books in a month and not put too much pressure on myself! It also helped that Asha (over at A Cat, A Book, And A Cup Of Tea) hosted her #ConquerAChonker reading weekend, meaning I could dedicate some time to reading some of the bigger books on my list.

To be fair, the standout book of the month has to be The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches. I will be reviewing this closer to release day, but if you want cosy vibes, grumpy x sunshine romance and found family, then go and pick this up. This is a book that I can say with some certainty that I will be re-reading fairly regularly!

I also managed to re-read The Jasmine Throne, for my re-reading series (the introductory post can be found here), so keep an eye out for my review! I’m really looking forward to diving into the other 2 books and to reading my arc of The Oleander Sword.

Goodreads / Storygraph reading challenges:

I actually finished my Goodreads challenge of 50 books back in June, so I’m now up to 57 books for the year and sitting at 114%! I’m not going to amend my target – instead, I’m going to leave it at 50 and see how far I surpass it. Looking at the rest of my TBR for the year, I think it will be by quite a bit, but I’m not going to put any pressure on myself.

With regards to my Hodderscape challenge on Storygraph, I really need to do a check in type post for this. Not only will it let me see which prompts I’ve completed, but it will also let me see which ones are still outstanding. At the moment, it’s sitting at 8 out the 12 completed, so it’s looking pretty good 😀

Other things:

As I mentioned in my May wrap up, I’m not tracking the number of new authors and the number of books I’m clearing from my Kindle backlog as strictly as I have done before. However, I have been buying a number of new books over the last few months, so I’m going to switch my focus a bit to clearing that backlog as much as I can.

I also managed to do something not at all book related and watch Arcane on Netflix. In a nutshell, I *really* enjoyed it – the voice acting, animation and the soundtrack are all absolutely incredible. I’ve never played League of Legends, nor am I familiar with any of the characters from the game, but never did I feel lost or confused. If I get chance, I’ll try put my thoughts down on paper and write up a review post, but I definitely recommend it.

Lastly, I think I’ve finally found a posting rhythm! (I’ve only been trying to find one for 6 months!) Seriously though, I found a blog post that had some really useful tips and I’ve been putting them into practice. It has been so good and I finally feel like the blog is coming together a bit more now 😀

Anyway, apologies if that was a bit rambly! I hope your July went well too!