mid-year book freakout tag + some posts that i’ve been loving recently 🪄

have i ever talked about how much i love the name of this tag?? because all i basically do in this post is freakout.

hii apparently it’s already july and no one has any freaking idea on where the months actually went and what i have accomplished beside breathing this year. no seriously. i have this album in my photo gallery where i save the memorable pictures of every year and in the end make a short movie or something. when i opened it today and saw the photos from january my mind literally went “shut up- it can’t have been like 6 months since then.”

umm yeah. anyway. i think that’s enough rambling for a while because i think i might have an existential crisis if i keep thinking about that stuff. on to the bookish part of the post~~

so in 2021 i had planned to read 25 books because my board exams were gonna be taking up most of my time but in reality i ended up reading 51. i know it’s not THAT much- but even though my reading was lesser than before, i can easily say 2021 was my best year in reading.

but if 2021 was a busy year, i don’t know what 2022 is.

i didn’t have a fixed ‘goal’ in the starting of the year but later on i felt like setting a goal of at least one book a month. now that i’m feeling more enthusiastic and rebellious of the school system, i’ve decided to set it to 25. not much of an increase i know but whatever. maybe if i manage to make more time in my daily schedule, i’ll jump it up to 40 but meh we’ll see.

considering that, i’m pretty much on track atm. however, this year has been nothing remarkable in terms of books. i’ve been finishing series, devouring contemporaries and just picking up books based on whatever mood i’m in. a few good books but overall the year is going pretty average and i hate it.

another thing- i’ve also read like a LOT of webtoons this year but i didn’t add them to my shelves for this year because i wanted to track them separately. but if would add those on here, i’m sure the number of books would cross 30.

Best book you’ve read so far in 2022:
King of Scars, Leigh Bardugo

• brilliant plot and storyline
• well developed characters + character arcs
• unpredictable plot twists
• HEART-BREAKING writing
• mentions of the crows 🥲

sjskdfg LEIGH BARDUGO y’all. she did it before and she has done it again. the answer to this definitely has to be King of Scars because i remember being B L O W N A W A Y. like GOD this was brilliant af. and it would be an understatement if i said i would give the world to nikolai lanstov.

Nikolai had been told that hope was dangerous, had been warned of it many times. But he’d never believed that. Hope was the wind that came from nowhere to fill your sails and carry you home.

King of Scars, Leigh Bardugo

best sequel you’ve read so far in 2022:
Rule of Wolves, Leigh Bardugo

• leigh’s writing >>>>>
• dramatic ASF: not one chapter went by w/o my screaming myself hoarse
• unpredictability level upp ^^^ (ZOYAAAAA adlkbvjksk)
• storyline was great- a lot but still great.
• the character arcs are prolly my favourite
• crows cameos!!!!!
• that ending-

i’m sorry for being repetitive but this was really IT!! 😭🥺 i know a lot of people were disappointed by this book but i don’t really see why?? also oh my god- nikolai? absolutely killed me. that battlefield scene when he does that thing- you better know what i’m talking about- made me actually tear up and bawl at 2 AM because i couldn’t bear to see him like that- i love him so much dude. 💔😭

a part of the 30-40 texts i spammed my friend with lmao. AND I MEANT NINA NOT JINA SO SHUT UP

A new release you haven’t read yet, but want to:

okayy let’s see. i haven’t really been up to date with most of the 2022 releases but i do have a few that i want to get to. not like in an overly-excited way but yeah, they’re there on my tbr. maybe i’m not excited for them because a lot of mixed reviews, especially about the Portrait of a Thief but they weren’t enough to turn me away lol.

Most anticipated release for the second half of the year?

i don’t even need to open goodreads for this prompt- it’s most definitely BABEL BY R. F. KUANG !!! i mean- it’s R F KUANG WHAT DO YOU EXPECT-

• dark academia + victorian oxford theme !!
• linguistics !!
• tackles colonialism !!
• student revolutions !!
• a breathtaking cover reveal

add these to the mix and you have a screaming janhavi ahhaha

adkfbf HELL YES

Biggest disappointment:
Everyone has a Story, Savi Sharma

whoop yeah, i can rant about this dumpster fire of a book now.

• basically no plot- it’s like one of those hindi soaps that your grandma watches
• cliche tiresome characters and ZERO character development
• the writing was hands-down awful and sloppy and i can’t even-
  for example, this: “I needed that beautiful, brown-eyed creature that I had thrown away.” (he’s referring to the love of his life btw)
• insta-love ❗but worse than the normal ones- everyone falls in love with each other for their external beauty and nothing else whatsoever.
• more of an all-over-the-place ‘inspiring’ book than a novel, and not a good one at that.
• predictable at every. single. point.
• no logic ?? at all??
• utterly exhausting and i hated every moment of reading it until i decided to stop torturing myself and skipped like every other line.

Biggest surprise:
The Lucky List, Rachel Lippincott

ok so i don’t really remember the exact events of this book but i do recall:

• a pretty fun sapphic summer read
• kind of expected the mc to be bi but meh it’s fine
• i liked the romance!!
• small cozy town vibes make me nostalgic for some reason-
• it was quite interesting to follow the list and now i want one of mine
• simple and sweet and balanced between the story and character development and romance ❤

Favorite new author (debut or new to you):
Jesse Q Sutanto — Dial A for Aunties

a while back, the amazing rachel wrote a raving review about this book and i immediately knew i had to get to it!! and guess what, it’s every bit worth it omg.

• hilarious as hell
• asian families depicted as ACCURATELY as it can get lmao.
• so unrealistic but SO FUN
• the aunties are so iconic istg-
• writing was also great- every scene had me laughing my butt off (bc how?? can you text like that??)

i also ranted about this to one of my friends- and she loved it so much that she gobbled it up in one day. before our exams. yeah bookworms are crazy and you can’t do anything about it. so we both have rachel to be eternally grateful to now haha.

Most beautiful book you’ve bought so far this year (or received)?

i needed a few minutes to think about this and guess what y’all.
i haven’t bought a single book this year. I’M ENTIRELY FAILING AT BEING A BOOKWORM help.

i’m not kidding- all the books i’ve read this year are either from amazon prime, or ARCs, or my friend’s or books which i already had. like WHATT. how is this even-
brb, having an existential crisis.

Book that made you cry:
Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz

this book was such a refreshing read for some reason. i loved it. i loved ari, and i loved dante and i loved legs and man i just loved the whole story so much. this book was so beautiful and god- i wish everyone would read this. totally will get you sobbing.

Book that made you happy:
Loveless, by Alice Oseman

ok so- i know i’m supposed to talk about those bright sunshine-y YA books for this question but loveless just- idk man. this book did make me happy, but not that kind of happy where you’ll enjoy reading the book and suggest it to people.
this book made me happy in a deep, life-lessons kinda way. it will stay with me for years, probably my life. it helped me figure out a lot of things, and it made me bawl out at night. it left an impact on me and it’s something that i owe a lot of things to. this book made me genuinely and truly happy, i’m forever thankful to alice for writing this book because i loved every part of it.

What books do you need to read by the end of the year?

uhh i’m not the best person to be sticking to a tbr but there are a few books that i definitely need to read by the end of 2022 otherwise i’ll never forgive myself.

1. Our Violent Ends by Chloe Gong: i’m just very very afraid. and i don’t remember what happened in tvd except the main parts but yeah. but i’m mostly afraid.
2. The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller: no explanation needed- i’m ready to cry.
3. The Atlas Six by Olivie Blake: other than this being very hyped, it also sounds interesting and my heart needs all the dark academia i can get so yes, i better read this.

and we’re done with tag !! i really really wanted to type out an long rambly update but- life!! is just so busy 😭😭 I have two tests every week- one on saturday and one on monday so my weekends are practically gone -sob- and weekdays just pass away like a blur. IN SHORT, i have no idea how life is just speeding by and i’m honestly just aiming to fall asleep not feeling like i’m gonna die 🙂

ALSO i saw all the comments you guys posted and i’m honestly not ignoring you- i just wanna take out the time to properly reply to them, not just be like “haha thanks for reading”. so yeah maybe i’ll reply soon, maybe it will take a while but i promise i’ll get to them </3
speaking of commenting- i have commented on any of y’all recent posts (because again- time is going way too fast 😭) but- i read a few of them when i got the time and GOD i adore them!!! and i will be gushing in your comments section soon!!

here are some posts that i enjoyed particularly- some are recent, some are from a few weeks ago but all are super cool and i enjoyed reading them like a lot 💗:

• Rachel @ A Bookworm’s Paradise did the Mid-Year Book Freakout tag !
  rachel’s posts are always so interesting and genuinely amazing to read- and her intros are just 💯🤌. may it be a tag, or a discussion, or a review- i love reading her posts SO MUCH. and her mid year freakout tag was no exception- and we got stats!! :DD
• Jan @ Inkspun Tales did a discussion on Things she’d like to see more in books– and this post had me nodding and shouting “YES PLEASE” at every point jan made. Like friends drifting apart? MC staying single? lovers-to-enemies?? we NEVER get these kids of things. and i am now desperately in need of them. somebody mail the authors this list please.
• Cherelle @ A Bolt Out of the Book did a discussion on heroism, villany and anti-heroes and it BLEW MY MIND. 😍 She talked about so many things- the poppy war series and it’s MC fang runin (aka everyone’s favourite anti-hero), doctor strange and marvel movies, the trolley problem and it was so damn interesting to read about!!! plus cherelle’s writing is just brilliant and the way she put forward all of her points makes it so much easier and engrossing to read- i loved this post way too much omg <33
• Anoushka @ Dipped in Ink’s review of I Kissed Shara Wheeler and some recs made me want to have this book in my hands like RIGHT NOW omg. i love it when people ramble about books they like and oh my god i absolutely and completely adored this review!! go read the post!! and i’m gonna be picking up this book this month itself because now i have sky high expectations ^^
• sofie @ Me & Ink (aka the most wonderful soul ever <3) did the stranger things book tag!! and the second part of it– and hii i am obsessed. stranger things has my whole heart and life and omg it was amazing to find out that someone else in the fandom haha!! i agree with everything sophie said- steve’s friendship plots are SO MUCH BETTER than his relationship ones and max is perfect and ajlfskfshdjs-. anyway, you should go read both the posts because the vibes are immaculate and sophie’s writing is awesome and the pairings are on point and everything is just SO GOOD.
• sophie @ Me and Ink also did a review of Conan Gray’s new album, Superache which was super fun to read!! i adore conan so much and hearing his songs is my way of dealing with a tiring day. ❤️‍🩹 i haven’t heard the songs that many times, but reading sophie’s opinions on them makes me want to hear them all on repeat again lol. i think family line and summer child might be my favorites?? eh we’ll see. but in the meantime, go read the post!!
• Kashvi @ Misty Realms did a whole series of guest posts and interviews on her blog called Tales of the Realms: Pride Month (you can check out all the posts here!) and reading all those posts were my doses of serotonin haha! all of the discussions are so amazingly written and presented, and reading them made me honestly THINK about stuff. i especially loved reading the discussions of quiet pride, being asian/desi and queer, writing queernormative worlds and the gay umbrella effect discussions- please go check out the posts- they are brilliant and i wanted to thank kashvi for such an initiative 💗🌈
• Clo @ Cuppa Clo’s discussion on her love-hate relationship with social media was another post that got me thinking and reflecting about stuff and nodding at how well clo wrote about the topic. i wish i could write discussions like this- because this post was so well written i enjoyed reading it sm!!
• and lastly, ahaana is back!!! and she did a 1-year blogiversary q&a!! go show her some love because she’s the bestt and i love her and her posts so much 💗💗

well i know i said i wouldn’t ramble too much but yet here i am. (in my defense i’m like really bad at expressing stuff in a few words).

anyway, time to go and study now. i hope you enjoyed reading post as much i enjoyed writing it!🍿 the weather here has been cold and it’s raining everyday and i just want to lay in my bed reading a book all day but studies :DD everything feels kind of peaceful tho. mom let me drink coffee- so this weather has it’s perks lol. i hope you all are enjoying your days and reading good books 😌

let’s chat!! who’s YOUR favorite character in the grishaverse? which books are you aiming to read by december? most disappointing book? and link you recent favorite posts below- please!! i’d love to read them!!

janhavi