Not only is this going up on a Monday instead of Friday, but it’s also going to be my first post of 2024! 😂 I hope this means that I’ll be better at doing discussion posts this year because 2023 was a total flop in this regard.

Let’s Talk Bookish is a weekly meme created by Rukky @Eternity Books and hosted by Aria @Book Nook Bits, and it’s where we get to discuss certain topics, share our opinions, and spread the love by visiting each other’s posts! If you want to join in the bookish discussion fun, check out Aria’s page for more prompts.

Now without further ado… The topic asks us about:

2023 Reading & Blogging Reflections

Prompts: How many books did you read in 2023? Did you meet your reading goals? What were some of your favourites? What were your least favourite books you read this year? How did you feel about your blogging in 2023? What are your favourite posts you wrote in 2023? What are some of your favourite posts from the community that you read this year?

The last LTB of 2023 was actually a freebie* so after deciding that I was going to shake off the writing fatigue and write a discussion post, I figured this would be a great topic to round up the year and hopefully, kick-start a better year ahead. On that note, buckle up friends, this might be a long post!

* I just noticed that this is actually the first LTB topic of 2024 but I’ll still be getting mine up on Monday instead of Friday!

How many books did you read in 2023?

2023 was a much tougher year than I anticipated; in fact, I didn’t anticipate even a quarter of the things that would disrupt my mental health, reading and blogging. Surprisingly, I was still able to achieve my reading goal and even surpassed it by reading 162 of 150 books.

Did you meet your reading goals?

Ah, the portion of the post that I wasn’t looking forward to! 😂 Nah, but let’s just say that not long after the year started, my goals gradually got thrown out the window, lol. But I haven’t looked at them since I felt myself going wayward, so let’s see how I did.

• ✓ Read 150 books — Alright, we got this at least!
• ⇢ Project Backlist Reading Challenge — I semi-succeeded with Kal’s reading challenge but I’m gonna keep going in 2024. I chose two specific goals to achieve:
  • ✓ Committed Reader — I read more than one owned book per month!
  • ✘ ARCrasinator — It was a hard fail, friends. I’m still so behind on my ARCs… 😮‍💨
• ✘ 12 Book Challenge — I read 5/12 books in what I thought would be a super easy challenge. Welp! I’m thinking of trying again in 2024 and carrying over the books I didn’t read this year.
• ✘ Read more non-fiction than I did last year — LOL, a complete and utter nope! 😂
• ✓ Read more BIPOC authors — Roughly 50% of my reads in 2023 were by BIPOC authors. It’s not the biggest statistic but I’m continuing to be more intentional with who I decide to read so I hope 2024 will see that percentage get even higher! 💜
• ✓ Re-read (at least) 5 books — I just surprised myself by counting and I actually achieved this! I re-read five books this year: The Poppy War, A Darker Shade of Magic Trilogy (3), and Amari and the Night Brothers.

Well, that wasn’t as painful as I thought it was gonna be! Completing 3.5 of 6 goals isn’t terrible so I’ll take the win, lol. There were a couple of smaller challenges that I was thinking of that I didn’t even note so we’ll let those slide! 😂

Favourites and Most Disappointing Reads

Honestly, my 2023 year of reading was not that great. Yes, I read a lot of books but I feel like it was a lower quality reading year compared to previous years. This is in part due to 2023 being a horrible mental health year for me so sadly, there weren’t many new favourites this year. Here were some I loved though (in no particular order):

In contrast, these were books that I expected to love, adore, and be new favourites but they completely missed the mark for me (the last one was the only one I rated 3 stars).

How do you feel about your blogging in 2023?

I had several simple goals for my blogging in 2023:

• Post every day
• Schedule posts ahead of time more often
• Engage more in the blogosphere!

I didn’t end up posting every day, I didn’t schedule more posts ahead of time (although I really excelled in October!), and although I started off the year strong in engagements, it trickled down drastically by the end of the year. I was overly ambitious at the end of 2022 and didn’t expect to have my cup depleted so drastically—or so soon—at the start of 2023. There have been moments of deep guilt at not having engaged as much as I wanted to or unexpectedly falling off the map at random times throughout the year, but I’ve been trying to be kinder to myself.

I know I couldn’t have done better than I did and as much as it sucks to not have been as active compared to previous years, it’s a fact I have to accept and it’s OK. Books and blogging are hobbies (albeit a very expensive one, lol) but I can’t expect to give 100% to it when I don’t have it to give and again, it’s OK. I’m just thankful for the friends who have stuck around and know that you are one of the main reasons (if not the main reason) I continue to be excited to keep reading, blogging, and engaging as much as I can. 💜 I appreciate you all so much!

Favourite Posts I Made

Hmm… I honestly can’t think of any! 😂 I posted a few LTB earlier this year and those were fun:

• Let’s Talk Bookish: Reading Reviews & Spoilers
• Let’s Talk Bookish: Collecting Books

A couple of reviews I enjoyed writing were:

• Dance of A Burning Sea by E. J. Mellow
• The Dead Romantics by Ashley Poston
• Shucked by Kate Canterbary
• Highly Suspicious and Unfairly Cute by Talia Hibbert
• Small Miracles by Olivia Atwater

Favourite Posts from the Community

This would be too tough to choose from but every month I do include a selection of community posts I enjoyed reading that month, so I’m going to leave links to those!

January | February | March | April | May
August | September | October | November | December

And that’s it for my last LTB written in 2023 and my first LTB posted in 2024! 😂 How was your year of reading and blogging in 2023? I hope it was a good year for you! Personally, I hope 2024 is going to be a much better year for me cos 2023 was not it (lol) and if you feel the same way, I hope you will have a much better year ahead, friends!

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