Ok, so it was actually June 25th, not July 25th… I got a little mixed up on the month. Oops!
Wow! I can’t believe it… 3 years of blog reviews! Crazy. I am so bad at keeping journals and blogs up and running. I’m so happy that I’ve been able to keep this going, keeping it updated and managing to review almost everything I’ve read since I started in 2018.
2020 was *clearly* a difficult year for everyone. It also turned into a very difficult year of reading for me. I did not get much read that year because I was just feeling so depressed. I really struggled with having the focus to read or the motivation to finish anything. For 2020, reading was so difficult, I did not accomplish any of my reading challenges or goals. Reading is my favorite activity, so not feeling up to read made the depression I was feeling even worse. Man, 2020 was just a nightmare, right?
Something that helped me get better were audiobooks. I’ve always liked audiobooks before, but for the rest of 2020 and the start of 2021, it was almost all audio. It really helped me focus without having to look at the words or sentences. Somehow this helped me focus more on the story.
By the time early 2021 rolled around, I was feeling a little better. I was able to read some physical/ kindle books again. Physical reading is still pretty difficult for me at the moment, so I’m still mostly listening to audio. It is helping me get through these rough times and still get to enjoy my books.
For 2021, I decided to take a year off from reading challenges. No long lists of difficult prompts, no book bingo, no challenge to read 90 books a year. Although, I did keep a *loose* book goal of #50 books for 2021. Just a simple goal. If I get there I get there, if I don’t, it’s ok.
So far, this year has been filled with good books. I’ve been having a lot of fun and most of the books have been rated highly. There have only been a few 1 or 2 ratings, and a couple of Did Not Finish books that just weren’t the right fit for me. I’ve been keeping pretty productive on Netgalley, getting my score over 80%! I thought that was impossible. I’ve been keeping my Netgalley list updated and reviewing books (mostly) on time.
Over the 3 years, my reviews and blog have really grown. I’ve been working hard to give reviews full of details. It has been important to me to “speak” in my own voice. Nothing fancy. I want to give reviews like I’m chatting with a friend, not a college professor.
Hopefully I will be able to grow the blog even more by the time of the 4th year anniversary! I will continue to work on my reviews to make them the best that I can. And of course, I plant to keep reading! Next year I’d like to get back to all the fun challenges I used to do.
I am thankful for all the likes and follows the blog has received over this time. Thank you! I really appreciate it! 🙂
Creature From The Book Lagoon 