October TBR

I'm back with another TBR! If you missed my September TBR, you can check it out here. I really enjoyed writing that one, so I decided to do it again for the month of October!

Last month I actually stuck with my TBR pretty well! I read all of the books I listed except Once and for All by Sarah Dessen. Instead, I read To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. Go Set a Watchman was on my TBR, and after reading that one, I was dying to read To Kill a Mockingbird. I would never have imagined reading To Kill a Mockingbird for fun five years ago when I was forced to read it, but this time, I loved every page! It was such a good book. I couldn't even reconcile this fascinating, gripping story with the dull one that I had read all those years ago. I think I was just at a better age for really understanding all the nuances of the book.

My September TBR

It's officially September!! I've started moving into my new apartment (update coming soon!), school is starting at the end of the month, and fall will be here before we know it (September 22nd is officially the first day!). We are also two-thirds through 2017! Eight months down, four to go.

In celebration of a new month, I thought I'd do something new on the blog today (which I kinda want to start doing at the beginning of every month from now on!) -- share my monthly TBR!

What is a TBR, you ask? TBR stands for To Be Read. It's the list of books that you have on-deck, ones that you plan to read in the near future. Since I have been enjoying a renewed love of reading this year (and am well on my way to reaching my 2017 goal of reading 52 books!), I thought it'd be fun to show you what I'm planning to read this month. There are five books on this list, so it is possible that I won't get to them all. It is also possible that I will become intrigued by another book and abandon the plan completely. But that's all okay! It's as much fun for me to talk about books I want to read as it is for me to talk about books that I have already read.

Recent Reads

I love an excuse to talk about books, and this blog is the perfect excuse! As you probably know, I'm trying to read 52 books this year -- one for every week of the year -- and somehow, I'm still on track with my goal! Week 27 is ending today, and I've read 28 books so far. I am currently reading The Sword of Summer by Rick Riordan. I've been reading Riordan's books since I was in 6th grade. His Percy Jackson series will always be one of my favorites. That series is largely responsible for helping me develop my love of reading, which, believe it or not, was nonexistent until around 9th grade. So, even though Riordan's books are below my reading level now, I still faithfully try to read his new books (which he cranks out like crazy!).

Now onto books I've already read!

A Catch-Up

 

It's officially summer break! I feel like I was the last student on Earth to get out of school (that's the quarter system for you), but now I'm ready to enjoy a long, relaxing summer.

It has been a crazy last few days for me, so I decided to write a quick catch-up post. My last catch-up post was in December, so its time for another one! Besides, I love writing these because they are so unstructured and I can talk about whatever I want, whether it all relates or not!

Last Thursday, I moved out of the dorms!! I never really thought past the first year of college, and now I have moved out of the dorms and have been promoted to the status of sophomore. Wow! The moving-out process was pretty intense. It was so insanely crowded and there was virtually no parking. We had to carry all of my stuff from my dorm down to the parking lot in 100° heat. (To be honest, I actually only took one load down to the car. My dad did most of the hard work! That one load was enough to make my arms sore the next day though, so I don't know how he did it!)

Recent Reads

So I was planning to write another catch-up post (like this one), where I talk about what I've been reading, listening to, watching, eating, etc., and I practically wrote the entire thing, but as I neared the end, I started to realize how much of it was about books. So, as I struggled to come with anything interesting that I've been doing lately besides reading books, I decided to just start over, admit my life is boring, and give in to the temptation to write a whole post solely about books. Also, since I'm in the midst of finals week, I didn't have too much time to put into this post, so I had to settle for this picture I took last summer, when I was reading The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah, which is still one of my all-time favorite books, by the way.

I never before realized just how much I liked reading until this year. I mean, I knew I liked reading, but suddenly I'm super into it. I always thought I was a slow reader, but that's just because I didn't read enough. I think it's mostly because high school was way more stressful for me than college (go figure). Now that I have more mental energy, it's easier to find enough focus to read instead of mindlessly watch TV. So I'm trying to take advantage of this relatively less stressful season in my life to read as much as possible. Whenever I go to the library or Barnes and Noble, I always tell myself, "You need to read more! Look at all these books there are to read!!" After all, my to-read list on Goodreads has 72 books on it... So now I'm making an effort to read as much as possible so I can get to as many as I can!