Monthly Wrap-Up – May 2024

Books Read – MAY 2024

Back in April, I noticed I was having trouble staying interested in staying interested in a book enough to finish it. That trend grew much worse in May. I don’t think I have read this few books in a month since I first learned to read! It’s really worrying me. I did manage to get through three audiobooks in addition to the three Kindle books, and I started or got halfway through several other Kindlebooks, but still… only six books?! Inconceivable!

Books

Title links (if there are any) go to my reviews.

1. The Magic of Four (Celia Lake)
2. NaNoWriMo Inspirations (Dave Farland) – (reviewed 5/17/2024)
3. The Golden Chance (Jayne Ann Krentz) – (reviewed 5/17/2024)

Audiobooks

1. Bookshops & Bonedust (Travis Baldree; read by the author) – (reviewed 5/09/2024)
2. The Winter Sea (Susanna Kearsley; read by Rosalyn Landor) – reread
3. The Firebird (Susanna Kearsley; read by Katherine Kellgren) – reread

Challenges

Below are the books I read for various challenges. Since I have not written or posted all the reviews yet, some may not show up on my 2024 Challenges tracking page (which isn’t working yet anyway.) All links go to my reviews.

Goodreads Challenge 2024: 6 books read or listened to in May. 69 books read this year so far, toward my year-end goal of 125 books. (Titles listed above.) Note: Goodreads is not accurate. As of June 8, the count should be actually 70, but Goodreads now thinks it’s 73. One of the “extra” titles is Madeline Miller’s short story, “Galatea,” which I am not counting as a book Another “extra” title is Wards of the Roses, which GR thinks I read twice in February, even though the “read” dates only show one set of dates for Feb. I haven’t yet figured out the other extra title.

The Backlist Reader Challenge 2024: 0 books read and 0 books reviewed in May. (NOTE: The Golden Chance and NaNoWriMo Inspirations are both backlist titles, but they don’t count toward the challenge because neither was on my TBR list when the year began.) For the year so far, 5 books read and 3 reviewed, toward my year-end goal of reading and reviewing 16 books.

Audiobook Challenge 2024: In May, I listened to 3 audiobooks (titles listed above) and reviewed 1 of them (Bookshops & Bonedust.) For the year, I have listened to 6 books and reviewed 3, toward my year-end goal of 10 books.

Library Love 2024: 1 books read and reviewed in May (Bookshops & Bonedust.) So far this year, I have read 2 books and reviewed 2, toward my year-end goal of 12 books.

NetGalley & Edelweiss Challenge 2024: I read 0 ARCs in May. I did post 1 review for a book I read in April (Love at First Book.) For the year so far, 15 books read and 7 books reviewed, toward my year-end goal of reading and reviewing 15 books. Current NetGalley percentage: still 52%; I started the year at 52%.

COYER Unwind, Chapter 2 (Spring): In May, I read 6 qualifying* books (all of the titles I read this month) and reviewed XX (Bookshops & Bonedust; NaNoWriMo Inspirations; The Golden Chance.) I posted 1 review for a book I read in March for Chapter 1 (Love at First Book.) Although I am counting that for Chapter 1, the COYER Challenge actually counts it toward Chapter 2. For the Chapter 2 challenge so far, I have read or listened to 7 qualifying* books and reviewed 3. My 3-month challenge goal is to read and review 10 qualifying books between April 1 and June 30.

*To qualify for the Spring COYER challenge, (A) the book can be in any format, including both digital and print. (B) I must own it or borrow it (from the library, Amazon Prime, or a friend.) ARCs count, but books from subscription services like Kindle Unlimited or Audible Plus do NOT qualify. (C) If I paid for it, the book must have cost less than $5 for an ebook or print book, or $7.50 for an audiobook. Chapter 2 of the COYER Unwind Challenge began on April 1 and ends on June 30.

Resolutions (this month)

Writing: Days I wrote: 23. Number of words written: 14,044. My goal was to write every day (I missed 8 days), and my word-count goal was 7,750 (I wrote nearly double that amount.)

Reviews posted this month: 4 (titles), so while I didn’t meet my goal of one review per week, I averaged out pretty close to it.

Reviews of ARCs from 2023 or earlier: 0, so I failed to meet my goal of one overdue ARC per month. So far this year, I’ve written only 1 review for an overdue ARC.

Prioritizing reading time over screen time: In May, I didn’t spend much time watching TV, but I didn’t get much reading in, either.

Pruning and reorganizing my book collection: I completely fell down on tracking this by the numbers, so I think I’ll just look at the overall picture from now on. We took two boxes of books to the used bookstore and dropped off the remainders for the library book sale. I have a small pile of workbooks to give a former student who will be homeschooling her young children. I’m in the process of moving books to the basement for the duration of getting our floors redone and our walls painted. I did buy four books from the used bookstore using the credit from the books I sold them (which I probably shouldn’t have done.)

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