Happy Readathon Day, bookworms! Hope everyone has all their favorite books and snacks ready. Usually, by now I’ve posted a hopeful TBR, but this year I’ve bought a house, moved, and kept everything going while I did. I’ve planned so much that literally when I wrote my last novel I never even wrote a plot. I’m a plotter through and through, but besides some notes at the bottom of the document my upcoming holiday novel Catnip and Mistletoe (Book 10 of Love by Glitter Bomb) was entirely pantsed. For those of you who know me personally or follow the blog you know that’s not how I usually do things. I think maybe moving this time planned me out. To be totally honest, the last few months have felt like an emotional hangover with all the big changes happening so quickly.
I’m on a roll this year with reading, though. Last year I scrapped by with 200 books because of the pandemic. Before that I couldn’t even swing 100 a year. I think I hit 80ish in 2019. Which was still a lot, but friends were reading way more than I was. This year I kept that ‘updated’ reading habit. Stressed? Read. Shit happening I can’t control? Read. Too tired to do anything else but it isn’t time for bed? Read. Seriously, I think my brain just liked that part of lockdown. Though, to be honest, even through moving I saw as few people as possible and pretty much have gone back into my own semi-lockdown mode since finishing everything. I live in a pretty conservative area and don’t trust people to be smart with the pandemic. Sorry, not sorry. I’ve seen what people do here.
Anyway, that was a side tangent, what I meant to say, was despite reading 175 books so far this year I still have shelves of unread books and today that’s a good thing. I’ve planned a lot of my reads this year between r/bookclub over on Reddit (if you’re looking for an online bookclub that reads diversely check us out!) and buddy reads. So, I’m ready to go back to browsing my unread shelves and finding my next read that way. Some of the books were bought years ago and it’s like finding a surprise. Don’t worry. The books I read and don’t want to keep forever are gifted/donated/given to the library. They’re not sitting in a landfill or filling up my entire house until I’m just at a table with coffee and a laptop writing my next novel.
So, that’s exactly what I plan to do in a few hours. I’m going to comb my shelves and find something totally unplanned to read. Usually, I have a blogging/check-in plan too, but not this time. Maybe I’ll check in throughout the day or maybe I’ll just come back tomorrow morning and do a wrap-up. But I have my pumpkin spice coffee and lots of options.
Happy reading, bookworms!
Maggie Hemlock Books 