Monthly roundup: February 2019

I swear, the last time I looked up, it was January. And now February’s gone. Whaaaaaaaaat???

Actually, I know what happened. I spent the entire month with my face shoved in various books.

Which isn’t a bad thing, lemme tell you.

It’s been another great month of reading around these parts, and a good month for all things bookish in general. I finished listening to all the back episodes of the What Should I Read Next podcast, and in my search for what I should listen to next, I stumbled upon All the Books, a weekly podcast from BookRiot about new book releases, hosted by the always funny Liberty and Rebecca. I’m super in love with this podcast and have been listening when I try to fall asleep, and when I’m in the kitchen getting dinner together. Be warned, though, your TBR list will explode like a fire hydrant that’s been knocked over by a Mack truck. (And for more TBR-ruining fun, BookRiot has a TON of podcasts with hours upon hours of back episodes. Enjoy!)

And with that, here’s a recap of all the amazing books I plowed through during the bitter cold of February 2019.

1. Humming Whispers- Angela Johnson

2. Assimilate or Go Home: Notes from a Failed Missionary- D.L. Mayfield

3. My Favorite Half-Night Stand- Christina Lauren

4. Josh and Hazel’s Guide to Not Dating- Christina Lauren

5. Heretics Anonymous- Katie Henry

6. The Girl with Seven Names: A North Korean Defector’s Story- Hyeonseo Lee with David John

7. Bear Town- Fredrik Backman

8. Hamartia- Raquel Rich

9. Ration Book Cookery- Gill Corbishley

10. Dear Fahrenheit 451: Love and Heartbreak in the Stacks- Annie Spence

11. Called to Be Amish: My Journey from Head Majorette to the Old Order- Marlene C. Miller

12. Paperback Crush: The Totally Radical History of ’80s and ’90s Teen Fiction- Gabrielle Moss

13. All We Ever Wanted- Emily Giffin

14. Lucy and Linh- Alice Pung

15. Destiny’s Embrace- Beverly Jenkins

16. Hidden Figures: The Untold True Story of Four African-American Women Who Helped Launch Our Nation Into Space- Margot Lee Shetterly

17. Time Zero- Carolyn Cohagan

18. We’ll Fly Away- Bryan Bliss

19. The Woman in Cabin 10- Ruth Ware

We also had a discussion on all the strange and interesting places we’ve read!

I may be a tad bit obsessive about reading lately, eh? But hey, it’s been cold out. All the better to huddle under my heated throw and turn page after page after page.

My February reading felt amazing. Compared with last month, I have a more diverse group of authors, which is definitely something I’m aiming for. And I’ve got a good mix of fiction and nonfiction, which is awesome. Only three of these books came from my Goodreads TBR list, which is fine by me; one was a review copy; several were books I’d been meaning to read for a while; quite a few were new-to-me authors.

I also attended my first library book discussion group meeting! I was a nervous wreck (my anxiety knows no bounds and absolutely extends to social situations. Part of going to this group is my attempt to get more social interaction outside of the people I’ve married and/or have given birth to, which has seriously been like 99.99999999% of my social interaction for, oh, about the last twenty years or so. Not exactly healthy, even for an introvert), but it was AWESOME. I engaged in so much book banter and impressed them with the binder in which I take copious notes on everything I read (which prompted the librarian to jokingly offer me a job!). I’m so happy that I pushed my boundaries and joined the group; I already can’t wait for next month and am lamenting the fact that I’ll miss May’s meeting, since my son has a choir concert that night.

So how’d I do for challenges?

As far as the Modern Mrs. Darcy 2019 Reading Challenge, I’m two-thirds of the way through ‘Three books by the same author;’ one more Christina Lauren and I’ll be able to cross that one off fully. And I managed to tackle ‘A book in translation,’ which I expected to be a lot more difficult (having had some weird experiences with books in translation in the past); Bear Town was amazing. So here’s where I’m at with this list:

I’ve already managed to cross five items off the list of Book Riot’s 2019 Read Harder Challenge, which is pretty huge for me! #12, a book in which an animal or inanimate object is a point-of-view character, has been covered by reading The Adventures of a South Pole Pig by Chris Kurtz last month, and #9, a book published prior to January 1, 2019 with fewer than 100 reviews on Goodreads, was covered by reading Hamartia by Raquel Rich. #6, a book by an author of color set in or about space, was fulfilled by finally reading Hidden Figures by Margot Lee Shetterly, and #16, an historical romance by an author of color, was fulfilled by reading Destiny’s Embrace by Beverly Jenkins. We’ll Fly Away by Bryan Bliss, which absolutely gutted me, counts as #1, an epistolary novel or collection of letters. Not bad for a challenge I only decided to take up on February 21st. And here’s my Book Riot list:

Onward to great reading in March!

How was your February???