Mid-Year Book Freak Out Tag

Here’s another fun tag! I know it’s a little late and belated since it’s August, but oh well! I feel like I freak out a lot but I also don’t…I guess I’m dramatic on the inside. I’m an ambivert so it’s a 50/50 depending on my mood honestly. Anyway.

The first quarter of the year I was in the biggest book slump ever. I did not read a lot, and I was mentally and physically failing, then I managed to get back on the bandwagon and have since then been reading better than ever.

Let’s see how my reading has gone the last 6 months or so through my stats and the tag questions now:

Total Books Read: 40

Total Pages Read: 15089 pages

Goodreads Challenge Status: 40/50 books (11 books ahead of schedule)

Longest Book: Obsidio by Jay Kristoff and Amie Kaufman – 615 pages

Looking at these stats, I’m pretty proud of myself. Last year my challenge was 65 books, this year it’s 50 but I’m killing it. I might increase to the mighty goal of 100 soon if I hit the 50 mark soon. I love the page count even more though because every day I do try to read between 50 to 200 pages a day so it’s crazy to see how many pages I’ve read so far even with a book slump for the first few months 🙂

Let’s get onto the tag questions now! Note that I haven’t answered them all cause this post would be way too long since I do babble a lot. Let’s go!

Best Sequel of the Year

I’ve read quite a few amazing sequels in the mere number I have read. I’ll pop my top 3 for each question I think if there’s more than one cause these were all so amazing! My favourite sequels are:

New Release You Haven’t Read Yet but Want To

Oh my gosh, there are so many new releases I want to read!! For this question, these are my top 3 that I own and aren’t sequels cause that would make it way too hard to choose, and I really want to read them by the end of the year at least:

Anticipated Release for Winter/Spring

I’m figuratively drooling because I want these books so bad right now. Muse is, of course, NUMBER 1 since Strange is basically my favourite book. I am really anticipating Kingdom of Ash because I do love Throne of Glass but I also need to read Empire of Storms and Tower of Dawn for the first time in anticipation for this one because I’ve just put them off for ages now. I don’t know why. Maybe it was cause I was in a huge book slump earlier or I’m devastated the series is ending or because I’m scared my heart will break or maybe all of the above. Anyway, all I know is that basically all of October and November I’ll be doing rereads for this series and others in anticipation for new releases. Wildcard, of course, is super highly anticipated as well since I loved Warcross to bits!

Biggest Disappointment Of the Year So Far

My biggest disappointment has to be goddamn Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell. I can hear the crowds groaning. So SO many people (including my best friend) told me to read it because it was amazing, so I read it…and I kinda…hated it. I went into it thinking oooh I’m gonna love this, then it was just…

Biggest Surprise of the Year

The biggest surprises were definitely Save the Date by Morgan Matson and Circe by Madeline Miller. I did not expect to love them as much as I did. I had suspiciously started hearing a lot about Morgan in the days before it was announced the book was coming out, but I had never heard of her before. She’s actually one of my best friend’s favourite auto-buy authors and I had no idea! Morgan is definitely on my auto-buy list now, I’ve had urges to just haul all her past books I’ve yet to read a lot lately. Circe was another surprise. I loved the cover but I sadly don’t know much about Greek Mythology so it was super interesting and an amazing read too. (I tried to get my mum to read it but she literally DNFd at page 6, cause she “didn’t like the people”. They’re GODS MUM. THAT’S THE POINT. THEY’RE NOT NICE–) Anyway. Let’s move on. The Start of Me and You was also such a cute read omg I did not expect it to be so good.

New Favourite Author

Well, as I said above, definitely Morgan Matson, Madeline Miller & Emery Lord! There are so many more this year, gosh ok so: also Pierce Brown (Red Rising was amazing), Sally Thorne (I loved The Hating Game to death and I’m so excited for her upcoming novel) and of course the author of a book that broke me (A Thousand Perfect Notes), it’s C.G. Drews.

I just love them all!!!

Your Newest Favourite Character

Ahhh this is the worst. My book memory isn’t great. Even after an amazing book, a week later I won’t remember the protagonist’s full name. *scrolls through Goodreads for what I’ve read this year *

Ok, I’m back: here are my newest fav characters:

• Rowan & Citra from Scythe and Thunderhead. They’re both such badarses and so brave. I love them.
• Beck from A Thousand Perfect Notes. I just want to hug him. Hug him and give him everything he deserves *sobs*
• Lemon Fresh from LIFEL1K3, just her name makes me smile and her spunky attitude was so fun.
• Sevro from Red Rising and Golden Son. He’s just so funny throughout the books and also tough and I just adore him.

Books that Made You Cry

Um did you not notice me earlier, literally sobbing just from thinking about Beck from A Thousand Perfect Notes? It’s perfection at breaking your heart. So many contemporaries I’ve read made me cry too (omg am I becoming…*gasp* emotional?). Another two books that had me balling were definitely Since You’ve Been Gone by Morgan Matson and Simon Vs the Homosapiens Agenda. Top reads guys, top reads.

Most Beautiful Book You’ve Bought This Year So Far

I buy books pretty regularly and as a design student, I’m guilty of many many cover buys. The following three fortunately were not but they are definitely beautiful and I think the most beautiful ones I can pick so far this year.

Books You Need to Read by The End of the Year

I might make this a page actually…and cross a book off every time I’ve read. Yes, a physical TBR page so you can see what books I’m physically drowning in at home (kidding, they have shelves I’m no savage :P) I think I will do that! Great idea Truffles.

Anyway here are some of the books I really need to read this year (I’ll try to keep it short):

• Finish The Raven Cycle Series
• Finish the Throne of Glass Series
• Re-read the second half of TMI, TID and read The Dark Artifices
• Crooked Kingdom
• Hunting Prince Dracula
• Godsgrave (and maybe a Nevernight reread)
• A Darker Shade of Magic
• The Bone Season series
• The Crown’s Fate
• Caraval
• All of Morgan Matson’s books that I haven’t read.
• I think I’ll stop there haha, you can see that I have many books to read.

And that’s it for the Mid-Year Book Freak Out Tag! What did you think? See any familiar books you’ve read or would like to read too? Let me know in the comments!

xx Tracy