It’s been a while since I’ve written a post here but it’s that time of year where I renew our domain & hosting so I get to thinking about this blog. To be honest, this past year has been very intense for obvious reasons but somehow, I’ve managed to keep reading through it. Now that I’m finished my master’s (omg that is a sentence I get to type), I’ve been thinking about which hobbies and things I want to take with me going forward and I’ve decided to revive this blog a little! I originally wanted to make a newsletter-type format but I figured instead of establishing a new platform, I can try and use the one I just paid for.
That said, welcome to a little corner of Shelly’s brain! This series (if it becomes a series) is tentatively called Reading Diary and I wanted to share some of the best books I’ve read this year so far. I wanted to try and make this more of a narrative instead of a book list so I hope you enjoy reading this! To be honest, this post was getting too long so this post actually only covers until February 😅. I’ve been reading so much so if this series is interesting enough, I hope to continue it with a second entry! Please feel free to leave a comment and tell me how you’ve been doing, I’d love to hear it.
Novels
I’ve been taking part in a Read What You Own reading challenge (the one I’m doing is hosted by Milana @ A Couple Reads on Instagram!) and it really inspired me at the beginning of the year to read lots of books that I own but haven’t read! The challenge did get a bit stalled mid-February for life reasons but I’m excited to pick it up again in the next few weeks! Some of the owned but unread books that I did get to include Caleb Roehrig’s The Fell of the Dark (which was a great fantasy adventure!), The Henna Wars by Adiba Jaigirdar (just delightful!) and The Fixer by Jennifer Lynn Barnes (a weird series to read during the beginning of the year as it deals with DC politics…). I was particularly happy that I finally got to read The Bride Test by Helen Hoang! I know some readers have been saying it didn’t compare to Hoang’s first book, The Kiss Quotient, but I actually thought The Bride Test was really interesting and I enjoyed the author’s note in explaining how she tried to incorporate more of her family’s story into the novel.
Speaking of romance, I totally went through a phase where I decided to read a bunch of Carina Press titles, especially from their fairly new imprint called Carina Adores! Two Carina Adores titles I enjoyed were Kim Fielding’s Teddy Spenser Isn’t Looking for Love and Hairpin Curves by Elia Winters. If you’re looking for some underrated queer romances, I highly recommend anything by the imprint! The guarantee of a HEA is definitely a selling point and I haven’t disliked any of their books yet! While not part of the Carina Adores line, I became obsessed with Jayce Ellis’ books. I’ve read all 3 of her novels so far and I can’t wait to read more! I even wrote a whole Instagram post about why I love them.
On the YA side, I went on a Rachel Lynn Solomon kick and read all her backlist books which I just adored. I loved Solomon’s debut, You’ll Miss Me When I’m Gone so I really have been meaning to read all her more recent YA titles. I love that the books all have lovely Jewish representation and I appreciate Solomon’s talent for creating characters that feel so lifelike.
Manga
I am honestly obsessed with a Japanese BL show called Cherry Magic! Thirty Years of Virginity Can Make You a Wizard?! and I actually read the first volume of the manga series of the same name when it was first translated into English! My adoration of the show made me pick up the manga series and gosh, it was just delightful. I re-read the series and even ended up buying the first two volumes for my collection! While the show ended already, volume three of the manga only comes out in English at the end of May so I’ll be eagerly waiting for that to release.
Another series that I started is Perfect World by Rie Aruga! My friends have been recommending this one for a while so I decided to finally read it and I’m so happy I did. While I have yet to get past the first volume, I’m really looking forward to continuing it sometime soon.
Have you read any of the books I talked about? Hopefully you loved them! Feel free to comment with any thoughts and hopefully I’ll see you for the next post!
Congrats on finishing your masters! I remember when I finished mine. I think I slept for several days to make up for all the sleep I missed during my final semester. I’m glad you’ve been reading some great books!
Aj @ Read All The Things! recently posted…Wrap Up: March 2021
thank you so much!!