Monthly Wrap-Up: June

Hello readers, and welcome to the end of June and the last day of the first half of 2021! It feels like the last year and a half ran by us all so fast, but so much has happened. Today, however, I’m going to focus on June. In the beginning of July, I’ll be coming out with a post that talks about the summary of the first half of 2021 for me, this blog, and my novel, A Feminist Wizard’s Guide to Gardening.

  I’ll get my list out of the way first. I read 15 books in June, once again beating my record.

• Naughty or Ice by Sylvia Pierce (18+)

• Life on the Refrigerator Door by Alice Kuipers

• Open Lanes by Mary Morano (18+)

• Stars Above by Marissa Meyer

• What If? by Randall Munroe—Audiobook

• Anne of Green Gables: Manga L. M. Montgomery, Crystal S. Chan, Kuma Chan—NetGalley ARC

• The Lost Ages Vol 1 by Jerome Le Gris

• The Devil You Know by Daphne Slade (18+)

• Sage and King by Molly Ringle—NetGalley ARC

• Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo

• How To? by Randall Munroe—Audiobook

• Dead By Dawn by Paul Doiron—ARC

• The List of Last Chances by Christina Myers

• The Next Wife by Kaira Rouda—NetGalley ARC

• The Darkest Part of the Forest by Holly Black

My favourite book was Stars Above. Because the Lunar Chronicles were some of my favourite books, Stars Above gave me all the feels. I cried, I laughed, and I learned so many of the things that were missing from the actual series. It was the perfect book to read as the final Lunar Chronicles book because it gives wonderful closure.  

My least favourite book was Anne of Green Gables: Manga, not because I didn’t enjoy it, but because it wasn’t as accurate of a retelling as I would like. I still gave it four stars, so it wasn’t my lowest rated of the month, but I have a special place in my heart for Anne Shirley. I will add that I think the overly emotional reactions that are commonplace in manga fit perfectly with the high emotions of Anne Shirley.

Time for my novel update for June. Of the fifteen beats I need to plan, I’m done with 10 of them. That brings me to the 75% mark. I was hoping to write chunks starting July 1st for Camp NaNoWriMo, and I believe I can begin doing that, while finishing up the final five beats during the first half of July. I need to start planning scenes, but I think I’ll start writing the beginning without a scene-by-scene plan. We’ll see what my brain decides the natural beginning is. Finally, my goal for Camp NaNoWriMo is going to be to write 50,000 words in the 31 days of July. They don’t need to be good words, of course. They just need to exist.

I can’t wait to get into July and start writing and reading the amazing books I’ve got lined up. Thank you for tuning in for today’s post! I’ll see you all in July.