Completely Full Bookshelf

If you're reading this on Monday from the United States, happy Memorial Day! I hope everyone is enjoying their long weekend. Also, if you're interested, don't forget to check out my Thursday Thoughts post on the woes and joys of book-hoarding ! I also want to mention that I will be participating in my very first reading challenge, the 2021 Big Book Summer Challenge hosted by the wonderful #IMWAYR blogger Sue Jackson at Book by Book ! This post is already alarmingly long as is, so I'll just mention that you can head to this link to hear about the books I'm challenging myself to read this summer as part of this event! For today's review for MMGM and #IMWAYR, I am looking at this year's Newbery Medal winner:  When You Trap a Tiger  by Tae Keller.          I've seen a few reviews of this book recently, but honestly, I haven't seen much attention paid to When You Trap a Tiger , this year's recipient of the Newbery Medal and the Asian/Pacific American

I am excited to announce that I am participating in my very first reading challenge! I don't normally do reading challenges, and I'm not planning particularly to do more in the future. But I was happy to participate in the  2021 Big Book Summer Challenge  hosted by the excellent #IMWAYR blogger Sue Jackson at Book by Book ! The rules for this challenge are simple: read at least one book before Labor Day weekend that is at least 400 pages long. Other than that, you're free to set your own guidelines, which I will now do! I have four big books waiting on my bookcase, and though I am not 100% confident I can get through all four this summer, I do plan to read: – At least ONE  of the Really Big Books  listed below, and... – At least ONE  of the Slightly-Less-Big Books  listed below! So let's see what these books are! The Really Big Books: The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue  by Mackenzi Lee A YA prose novel (544 pages) My mother recommended this book to me, and if

It's time for another round of Thursday Thoughts! In case you missed it previously, I'm trying out this new format of posts so I can bring you all ranting  interesting thoughts during the week, even when I don't have book reviews to share. In case you missed it on Monday, I reviewed a YA novel called Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe , written by Benjamin Alire Sáenz. This book was so spectacularly beautiful that it is hard to put into the words. I saw myself in it, I could barely put it down, and I marked it as an "All-Time Favorite" on this blog after just one read—I might change that in the future, but I'm letting myself leave it for now at least. This book lingered on my bookshelves for somewhere around five years. My current bookshelf setup (note that I've acquired more books since I took this photo). And that made me think about some things. You see, I consider myself a bit of a book hoarder. (Seriously, who would have guessed—

I hope you all are doing well! If you're interested, I took some time last week as part of my new Thursday Thoughts series determining whether the phrase "Don't judge a book by its cover" is useful advice...or not! Check it out here! But enough about me. For #IMWAYR today, I am recommending one of the most incredible books I have ever read in my life: Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe  by Benjamin Alire Sáenz. (I'm marking this as an "All-Time Favorite" on my blog—I may change that in the future, but I have a sense this book will be sticking with me for a long time.)  ( Update [June 14, 2021]: This no longer applies, as I now label my favorite books in a different way— click here for details .) Please note: this is a YA (young adult) book, not an MG (middle grade) book, and it contains mature content. 359 pages          I'll be talking about this a bit more in an upcoming Thursday Thoughts post, because I think it bears noting

During most of the year, it's hard enough to get a single book review up on this blog each week. But during the summer, I have loads more time that I can spend working on this blog, and so...I'll be posting twice a week! 🎊🥳🎉 Besides my usual book reviews on Mondays (which will always be my top priority if I am short on time), I'm trying a new format that I call  Thursday Thoughts ! Basically, I'll just be talking/ranting about a book-related topic that interests me each Thursday (or at least some Thursdays—let's not bite off more than we can chew, shall we?). With that...let's dive right in! At least once in your life, you've probably heard the phrase "Don't judge a book by its cover." Even if you don't read books, you've probably heard this phrase—we use it as advice about not jumping to conclusions about practically everything. I've always been guilty of ignoring said advice. I had a bad habit in the past of buying books with p

***Blog news!***  It's the summer now, which means I have way more time to devote to reading books and to blogging! As such, I am starting a new feature on my blog called Thursday Thoughts ! On at least some Thursdays, I'll be discussing book-related topics that I have opinions about and inviting you all to share your thoughts in the comment section! Note that these are not book reviews (I will continue to only post those on Mondays), but I hope these can be a new way for me to connect with my readers! (Also, if you want to see these posts in your Blogger reading list, I finally added a Follow button  on my blog sidebar!) ***Public service announcement***  I heard some weird things online about people's Blogger posts getting deleted recently. I have no idea if any of that was true, but it seems like a good time to remind you all to download a backup of your blog on Blogger periodically—to do so, go to your Blogger dashboard > Settings > Manage blog > Back up conten

Is anybody else having the urge to read every single book you own and have read, own and haven't read, or don't own at all? It is seriously driving me crazy, especially since, until the end of this week, I barely have time to read at all! But I do have a review for today, which I am writing at the very last minute, so it will probably be shorter than usual. Today, I'm looking at Concrete Rose  by Angie Thomas. A word of caution to any young readers: this is a YA (young adult) book, not an MG (middle grade) book, and it contains somewhat mature content.         If you're not aware (though most of you probably are), Concrete Rose  is the third book by the inimitable Angie Thomas, following up her showstopping debut The Hate U Give  and her excellent follow-up On The Come Up   ( which is getting a movie adaptation! ). Thomas has tackled countless different aspects of what it is like to be Black in the United States in her books, with The Hate U Give  being well-known for

First of all, if you have a blog on Blogger and have no clue what to do about the FeedBurner email subscription mess, good news—I made a video tutorial on how to move your subscribers over to my service of choice, Mailchimp! Click here to watch it —I hope it is helpful! I hope everyone is doing all right today! Summer is coming in just a few weeks, so I will have way more time to read books and write reviews. I do have some frantic weeks to get through before that, but I have somehow managed to get two different non-graphic-novel books into my reading schedule! One will be the subject next week's review, and the other is what I'll be reviewing today: the novel in verse Starfish  by Lisa Fipps.           I celebrated my birthday a few weeks ago and got an AWESOME selection of books (shown at left), and Starfish  was one of them. This book has been super-popular lately, and after seeing recommendations of it by the awesome bloggers Cheriee Weichel at Library Matters  and Lisa Ma