Blog & Reading Resolutions And Challenges For 2016

 

Hello Readers

I have resolved to set down a few resolutions in regards to  blogging and reading for 2016. I find, especially for blogging, it’s better to have a plan and stick to it for the most part.

I am a newbie to blogging and although I’m pleased with how my blog is doing so far, I want to focus more on original content for 2016. Now, that does not mean that I won’t be doing Blog/Book Tours, Cover Reveals and or Blasts because I love doing these.

It does mean, however that most of these will be promotional posts instead of review posts since I want to have time to read the books on my ever-growing TBR.

So here are the resolutions I have set out for my Blog for 2016:

• One Review (not including those for Blog Tours) per week to be done on a Wednesday and will be given a name
• My Week In Books is going to continue to be a weekly feature and will be done on a Monday
• A new feature to be introduced for Friday
• Monthly Wrap-Up to include posts made and number of reviews
• TBR not to exceed 10 books ( subject to addition or subtraction depending on how my week goes)
• Take part in more challenges or memes ( maybe something for Tuesday)
• Learn more about how to promote my Blog on Social Networks

Here are my Reading Resolutions:

• Read and Review all outstanding NetGalley books (including ARCs) before requesting anymore
• Be more selective about accepting Books for review
• Hauls not to exceed 5 books each month
• Revise my TBR List and ‘clean’ up my ereader
• Read only after I have studied at least 2 hours
• Try to exceed the number of books read in 2015
• Be more open to reading genres like Contemporary, Dystopian, Science Fiction and Literary Fiction
• Keep a better record of my books by adding to Goodreads

Now for a Look at The Challenges I will be participating In :

This challenge is hosted by Sarah K, The YA book traveler.

The Rules are:

• read a minimum of 1 book per month you already own (published book).
• I’m planning to read at least 10 books from my personal TBR and another 12 from NetGalley and any other books for review.
•  Use the hastag #RockMyTBR for current discussion.

This Challenge is hosted by: Alexa loves books and Hello, Chelly.

• Set a goal of how many fantasy books you are planning to read ( I’m going with: 20 books).
• Use #flightsoffantasy
  

This challenge is hosted by The Daily Prophecy. 

• Main focus on Fairytale retellings, but quite  okay to read other retellings (I’m doing a variety of retellings, see my post here)
• You can re-read books and cross-link them to other challenges.
• Spread the world with hashtag #fairytaleRC.
• Levels: (I’m aiming for Kuma Lisa)

-Enchanted Moura: 1 – 4 books.

-Goose Girl: 5 – 9 books.

-Evil Queen: 10 – 15 books.
-Wise princess: 16 – 20 books.
-Kuma Lisa: 21 – 25 books.
–Cheshire cat: 26+ books

There you have it Guys! What resolutions did you make for your Blog for 2016? Are you participating in any challenges?

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Challenge: Top 10 2015 Day 5:2016 Releases

Today is the 5th and final day in the Top 10 2015 Challenge and is my most anticipated day where I get to share 2016 Releases I’m looking forward to reading! I couldn’t stop at 10 so I have 10 honourable mention also. In no particular order here are my Top 10 2016 Releases I’m looking forward to:

A Court Of Mist And Fury sounds delicious and I can’t wait to read it!

Bloodfeud is going to be amazing…I just know it. I love all of Ben Galley’s books so far and I’m certain this is going to be awesome. If you haven’t read this series yet, I suggest you do so. Simply can’t wait to read and review and rave etc.

Nevernight is the first in a new series by Jay Kristoff , author of the Lotus War series which I loved so I’m curious to read this one.

Paper And Fire is the second book in the Great Library series and I loved Ink And Bone and I’m hoping the sequel is even better.

A Gathering Of Shadows is the second book in the Darker Shade Of Magic series and I loved the first book and I’m eagerly awaiting this new release!

The Crown’s Game is the first in a new series and the summary sounds like something I will enjoy.

A Torch Against The Night, the second book in the An Ember In The Ashes series. The first book was phenomenal and the second book had better be even better!

Lady Midnight is eagerly anticipated by many and I am curious since I liked the Shadowhunters books welle enough but still haven’t read the Infernal Devices. I was waiting for all three to be released in Dutch and I have since bought them and am now waiting until I can find the time to read them.

The Shadow Hour is the sequel to The Girl At Midnight which was really special. I am dying to read this and will most likely set aside whatever else I’m reading to get into it immediately.

The Raven King, the fourth and final book In the Raven Cycle has been delayed before and I’m hoping it actually releases in April because I NEED to know how it all ends. Can’t wait to read this too!!

Honorable Mentions

I couldn’t just stick to 10 in this category. I’m pretty sure I can come up with 50 titles off the top of my head but I’ll just drop these other 10 here that I’m dying to read! Check them out and click on the links to add them on Goodreads:

Frost Like Night

KingFisher

Rebel Of The Sands

Strange The Dreamer

The Darkest Magic

The Glittering Court

The Hanging Tree

The King Slayer

The Sleeping Prince

Truthwitch

That concludes this challenge and what fun I’ve had! What 2016 Releases are you eagerly anticipating?

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To 10 2015 Day 4: Book Boyfriends

Welcome to day 4 in the Top 10 2015 Challenge hosted by Fiktshun , and co-hosts Jaime of Two Chicks on Books, Mindy of Magical Urban Fantasy Reads, and Nancy of Tales of a Ravenous Reader!

Today’s Top Ten takes us into Swoonland where hearts palpate and pulses race and the heat gets ‘turnt up’! Book boyfriends! Sounds simple right?

I struggled to find 10 book boyfriends. This one was a real challenge so forgive me if some of these guys turn out to be a total waste of time. Book Boyfriends coming right up!

1. Rowan in Queen Of Shadows. He is not only handsome, he is smart, a warrior and experienced, after all he has had centuries to master and hone his ‘craft’ 😉
   
2. Jason Moros in Fated. His confidence and experience makes his irresistible!
   
3. Loki in Hour Of Mischief. I like his mischievous character.
   
4. Ambit in Broken Prophecy. Yes he might be a shameless womanizer but he is good for a few laughs and he is not afraid to go against convention which is pretty cool.
   
5. Tamlin in A Court Of Thorns And Roses. I plan to re-read this for the retelling challenge 2016, since my first read was kinda rushed .
   
6. Bruiser in Dark Heir. He is bad-ass and can hold his own in a fight. He is also romantic and knows how to woo his girl.
   
7. Cal from Red Queen. I was team Maven for a time but there’s just something about Cal!
   
8. Phillipe in The House Of Shattered Wings. He is a mystery and we only got to see snippets of his past and I’m already intrigued.
   
9. Captain Grim in The Aeronaut’s Windlass. All I’m going to say here is ‘Aye, Aye, Captain!
   
10. Clark Treasure in Treasure Darkly. He sounds like he could be a lot of fun and I like his self-sufficiency and ability to think on his feet.
    

 

That concludes my Top Ten Book-Boyfriends. I think I did pretty good. Have you met and fallen for any of these?

 

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Challenges: Top 10 2015 Day 3: Best Debuts

Hello Readers

Today is the 3rd day in the Week- Long Top 10 2015 challenge. I have chosen to give you my Top Ten Debuts 2015.  Now, for the purpose of this post, ‘Debut’ here means not necessarily the first book written by an author but can be the first book in a series. I know I might be bending the rules a bit and hopefully I’m not offending anyone by doing this. Feel free to check out what the host Fiktshun and co-host,  Jaime of Two Chicks on Books,  Mindy of Magical Urban Fantasy Reads, and Nancy of Tales of a Ravenous Reader choices are.

Without further ado here are my picks for Top Ten Debuts:

Novice On Goodreads
I loved this and I am dying to read the sequel. This had all the elements I love in fantasy.

Walk On Earth A Stranger on Goodreads
This was interesting and I am hoping the sequel will be better. The abilities didn’t really come into play much and I’m hoping to see that in the sequel.

 

A Darker Shade Of Magic On Goodreads
Technically , this is not a debut since the author has other written works but it is the first in a new series :). I loved this too. Anything with magic will grasp my interest and the book was well written and entertaining and had enough action to satisfy my taste for fight scenes.

Red Queen On Goodreads
I loved this one too! Yes it has a familiar fantasy trope but it was enjoyable nontheless. I have the Glass Sword ARC waiting to be read as soon as I can find the time, hopefully very soon!

 

Sugar Skulls On Goodreads
Oh my word! I fell in love with the cover art, then the premise and when I finally read the book, it was amazing. I loved it and I’m hoping for a sequel.

Hour Of Mischief On Goodreads
Loki is the star of this book and I loved the concept of each hour of the clock representing a God. I can’t wait to read and see what what happens in the sequel.

 

Forget Tomorrow On Goodreads
This was a good dystopian read. Not having read many dystopian novels, this one was surprisingly easy to get into and I’m loking forward to reading more in this series.

The Deathsniffer’s Assistant On Goodreads
What a great debut! This was very interesting with it’s magical and steampunk elements. Also looking forward to the next book.

 

A Book Of Spirits And Thieves
I didn’t love this one but I liked it well enough that I’m looking forward to reading the next book .

The Stars Never Rise
This was such a fun read! Demons and exorcists and the a conspiracy with the church at the center. Hello! Loved it!!

 

Voila! That was my Top Ten 2015 Debuts! Cheers.

 

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Challenge: Top 10 2015 Day 2

Hello Readers

For Day 2 in the week-long Top Ten 2015 challenge, I am going to share the 10 best book covers for books released in 2015! Here are my picks:

 

Untamed On Goodreads

Winter On Goodreads

 

 

Ten Thousand Skies Above You On Goodreads

Blood, Ink & Fire On Goodreads

 

 

The Sin Eater’s Daughter On Goodreads

DreamStrider On Goodreads

 

 

Black Widow: Forever Red On Goodreads

Crow Moon On Goodreads

 

 

The Conjurer’s Riddle On Goodreads

Angel Of Storms On Goodreads

These covers are beautiful!

 

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Challenge: Top 10 2015 Day 1: Best Books Read

Hello Readers

Welcome to my first Top Ten Post in this week of Top Tens. Today I have for you in no particular order:

Top Ten Best Books I Read In 2015

 

For the book synopses, I have included their links to Goodreads below and where I have done a review, I have included that link also.

Queen Of Shadows (received 5 stars)

Bloodmoon( 5 stars)

Sugar Skulls (5 stars) Review

Blade Of The Destroyer (5 stars) Review

An Ember In The Ashes (5 stars)

Ink And Bone (5 stars)

Department 19: Darkest Night (5 stars)

The Girl At Midnight (4 stars)

Arena 13 (4 stars)

Poet Anderson..Of Nightmares (4.5 stars) Review

What are your Top Ten best reads for 2015? Have you read any of those mentioned?

 

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Challenge: Top 10 2015

 

Hello Readers

I am excited to be participating in the Top 10 2015 hosted by Fiktshun , and co-hosts Jaime of Two Chicks on Books, Mindy of Magical Urban Fantasy Reads, and Nancy of Tales of a Ravenous Reader! This is a week-long event consisting of five different top tens!

The event runs for five consecutive days, the last week full of the year – Monday, December 21st to Friday, December 25th. Five days in which we share some of our favorite lists and the Schedule is as follows:

Monday, December 21st

• Best Books I’ve Read in 2015 (Doesn’t have to be released in 2015, just a book you’ve read in 2015)

Tuesday, December 22nd

• Best Book Covers of 2015 (MUST be a book released in 2015. Would be best if it’s a book you’ve READ in 2015, but it’s not required)

Wednesday, December 23rd

• Best ________ of 2015 (Reader’s/Blogger’s choice. Please fill in the blank with ONE of these topics – Villains, Contemporaries, Dual POV’s, Novellas, Adult titles, New Adult titles, Love Triangles, Couples, Bad Boys or Debuts. REMEMBER: this list MUST be from books you’ve READ in 2015)
  I’m thinking of doing Debuts for this one, if I can come up with 10. If not then I would go with Adult titles.
  

Thursday, December 24th

• Best Book Boyfriends of 2015 (MUST be from a book released in 2015 and from a book you’ve READ in 2015) This too is going to be a challenge to get 10!

Friday, December 25th

• Top 10 Books I’m looking forward to in 2016. (This list should be comprised ONLY of books released in 2016) Only 10?

If you want to join in the fun just click on the banner to take you to the original post and sign up, there you can have a look at the rules etc and link up your blog!

 

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Challenge: The 2016 Retelling Challenge

Hello Readers

In planning ahead for some fun stuff to do on my blog for 2016, I came across this challenge hosted by Mel at The Daily Prophecy .  I just recently started following her blog and  I love Mel’s posts about books, her bingo cards, challenges, and she seems to have a few giveways going on too, so feel free to check out her blog if you haven’t already.

Level I’m Aiming For:

Retelling Challenge 2016

If you don’t like fairy tale retellings, other retellings are also allowed – mythology, folklore, classics, and so on.

Since this is my  first time doing this challenge, and since the few retellings I have read aren’t super interesting, I am going to reign myself in and not try for the highest level.  Plus, I want to aim for an average of maximum two retellings per month so as to have time for other books.

Here are the challenge levels (from Mel’s blog):

There are 6 different levels you can aim for:

-Enchanted Moura: 1 – 4 books.Retelling Challenge Goose Girl
-Goose Girl: 5 – 9 books.
-Evil Queen: 10 – 15 books.
-Wise princess: 16 – 20 books.
-Kuma Lisa: 21 – 25 books.
-Cheshire cat: 26+ books

I think I will be able to read 21 – 25  retellings quite easily if I pace myself because they can get a bit much after a time which is why I have chosen a mixture of retellings.

Here are the books I plan to read for this challenge. As usual, I may deviate, if a new release pops up or I come across one that I just can’t resist, or simply because I hate rigidity! 🙂

 

That’s it for the Retelling Challenge 2016! I will also be joining the Goodreads Reading Challenge. Which challenges are you planning to take part in ?

 

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Awards: Dragons’s Loyalty Award

Wow! Thanks to the lovely EnthrallingDimple for nominating me. It was both surprising and welcome since it’s my first time ever being nominated or tagged. Awesome!!

The Rules are as follows:

 

1. Display the award on your blog
2. Announce your win with a post and link the blogger who awarded you
3. Present 6 deserving bloggers with the award
4. Link your awardees in the post and let them know of their being awarded
5. Write seven interesting things about you.

Let me just say upfront that I’m not very interesting so finding seven interesting things is going to be hard! On with it then:

1. I am a book hoarder. There. I’ve said it. No matter how many books I have on my TBR , I will keep adding to it because I simply need to get every book I think might be interesting. Thank goodness for ereaders otherwise my apartment wold look like this:
   
2. I often listen to an audio book whilst reading another book. How is that possible you might ask? In the beginning it was confusing but after a while , it’s just like listening to music while reading which I like to do too.
   
   
3. I don’t really have any hobbies other than reading which makes me pretty boring actually.
   
4. I’m often thought to be antisocial because i am somewhat of an introvert. I, however, prefer to think of myself as selectively social.
   
5. I hardly ever go to bed before 3 am. Nighttime is my time!!
   
6. I’m always reading when I should be studying
   
7. I love movies and Tv Series almost as much as I love reading…almost.
   
   

Now for the nominees! I nominate :

• Book Owly
• Chouett
• Swoon over Books
• Stephanie’s Book Reviews
• reader in a reverie
• BookWorManiac

Cheers!

 

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Book Tag: The Unpopular Opinions Book Tag

I came across this tag on My Tiny Obsessions and since she tagged everyone I consider myself tagged.

 

1. A Popular Book Or Series That You Didn’t Like
   I have started this book several times, since I have it both in English and Dutch but I just don’t like it. The cover is pretty though.
   
2. A Popular Book or series that everyone else seems to hate but you love.
   I really loved this and saw quite a few 1 or 2 stars being given on Goodreads. I will re-read this when I have a chance. I loved it that much.
   
3. A Love Triangle where the main character ended up with the person you did NOT want them to end up with (warn ppl for spoilers) OR an OTP that you don’t like.
   I can’t think of any. I do tend to root for the “bad boy” though. I’m not too fond of the goody goody two shoes kind of guy.
4. A Popular Book Book Genre That You Hardly Reach For
   Romance, Contemporary, Dystopian
5. A Popular Or Beloved Character That You Do Not Like
   
   Chaol in Queen of Shadows. I didn’t like him before in the other books but I really disliked him in this.
6. A Popular Author That You Can’t Seem To Get Into
   Lauren Destefano. I have tried to read quite a few books by this author but I didn’t like or finished any of them.
7. A Popular Book Trope That You’re Tired Of Seeing. (Examples, ‘Lost Princess’, ‘Corrupt Ruler’, ‘Lover Triangles’ etc)
   I am going to say “Lost Princess” even though once done right, it can be very enjoyable.
8. A Popular Series That You Have No Interest In Reading
   
   I think if I had read it before I saw the movies, I might have liked it even though I’m not really a Dystopian fan.
   
9. The Saying Goes “The Book Is Always Better Than The Movie”, But What Movie Or TV Show Adaptation Do You Prefer More Than The Book?
   
   I liked the Hellboy movies a bit better than the books. I am wondering why they haven’t made anymore because I would love to see another.Would you like to do this tag? Then consider yourself tagged!

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