What a reading month! I feel like it’s been quite some time since I read this much, perhaps 12-15 years ago?
I have made a point of reading instead of scrolling on social media. I admit that I chose too addicting books so I read more than I probablyshould have, it’s the fine line of wanting to choose good books to read but also picking books you can part with when you should do other things. Enough of that, let’s look at some stats!
I read 15 books; 11 novels, 3 graphic novels and 1 non-fiction.
English: 9 Swedish: 6
Audiobook service: 8 Library: 1 Owned: 6
Physical: 7 Audio: 1 Ebook: 1 Audio + Ebook: 6
I think I’ve been reading more in Swedish lately, it’s the romantasies I found on my audiobook service that were translated! I think that I read more than usual from my own shelf, halv of them were the graphic novels though.
Top rated books this month in reading order: * Blind Date Dith a Warewolf – Patricia Briggs * Wild Sign – Patricia Briggs * Maid For Each Other – Lynn Painter * A Business Proposal vol 3 and 4 – Haehwa, Narak * Silver Elite – Dani Francis
It is time for another round of Down the TBR-hole, where I go through the books in my To Be Read shelf on Goodreads and try to decide if I still want to read them (should they stay) or not (should they go?).
Dödsviskaren – Lovisa Wistrand Number three in a series, need to freshen up my memory before getting to this one. Added it to my audiobook shelf. Verdict: Stays
Kärlek på menyn (Summer at the Comfort Food Cafe) – Debbie Johnson I’m not really feeling it. I might just be in a period of wanting more adventurous stories at the moment am considering letting this one go. It does have a very high rating on Goodreads though and I’m wondering why, I’m adding it to my audiobook shelf. Verdict: Stays
A Lady by Midnight – Tessa Dare Fake relationship, I am intrigued. I have liked Tessa Dares books before, am adding this to my audiobook shelf. Verdict: Stays
Heart of Thorns – Bree Barton I’m feeling hesitant. And it’s not available at my audiobook service nor the library. Verdict: Goes
Heart of Rebellion – Sian Ann Bessey This one can either be quite boring or interesting. It’s a beautiful cover that makes me want to keep it, but I don’t feel like buying it to read it. Verdict: Goes
Syndätarens dotter (The Sin Eater’s Daughter) – Melinda Salisbury It seems like only the first book in the series was translated into Swedish, I guess it didn’t sell well. It’s available as an ebook at my audiobook service so I’ll give it a try. Verdict: Stays
Åminne – Sven Deblanc A friend of the family recommended this book. It’s available at the library so I’ll probably check it out sometime. Added it to my to-borrow-shelf. Verdict: Stays
The Tiger and the Wolf – Adrian Tchaikovsky I think I added this one to my TBR after gifting it to one of my friends. I’ve no idea if she’s read it but I’m still intrigued. Adding it to my audiobook shelf. Verdict: Stays
How did it go this time? Books in the TBR shelf at start: 240 Number of staying books: 8 Number of leaving books: 4 Total amount of leaving books: 59 Number of reserved books at the library: 0 Number of books put in to-borrow-shelf: 1 Number of books added to audiobook-account: 6 Current amount of books in my TBR shelf: 259
There was quite a few leaving this time. If I wouldn’t have free access to them on my phone, a couple of more might have made their way. Maybe I should do a series where I tryout the ones I’ve said I would give a go, perhaps a “trying one chapter” sort of post. Not sure what would happen with the ones I want to keep, will I just finish them directly? I’ll let this idea marinate for a bit.
The numbers on my TBR shelf is still higher than when we started, but we’re under 260 now!
Sweep of the Heart is the fifth book in the Innkeeper Chronicles series. I have enjoyed the previous books in the series but this one I found a little boring with the selection and political intrigues. I guess that the story in the background are going to slow and the side-quests (which were the selection in this one) were too long. The ending did have a nice pace and I was a little disappointed that there isn’t a next book to pick up.
I stumbled on The Spy and I while placing a book order. It was a pleasant read, not everyday we have a tech savvy main character. Some of the things she were doing though were a bit of a stretch, it doesn’t really hold up for close inspection, but I appreciate what it was trying to do. I was hoping for a little more. I think this could be a good romantic comedy movie, but for the book form I didn’t think we got enough substance to the relationship to really make them feel plausible. It was a fun read.
Do you have any recommendations for books with hackers or programmers as main character?
I’m not sure how it came that I stumbled upon Silver Elite, I think it might have been a “people who have read this have also read this” kind of situation. I ate this one up, read it when I was supposed to do other things. It highly entertained me but I didn’t think it was perfect. It fits nicely into its genre mould, wasn’t expecting any less from the twists and turns (maybe a bit more brutal than expected). Maybe that is also to the minus side of the story. The big reveal of a person was not possible to be another way to make sense to the story and the turns didn’t surprise. But I enjoyed it. Typically in this genre, the best part has already passed, I enjoyed the start and training. Might give the continuation a go to se the conclusion but I fear that I’ll have forgotten most of the story when the sequel comes out.
The Serpent and the Wings of Night was chosen as my next read because I wanted a series where the next book was already out. The last couple of romantasy books I’ve chosen have been first books where it’s months away to be able to continue (and also where these series usually loose me) so I tried to be more intentional with my choice. It’s been a while since a read a vampire book (unless there was vampires in Quicksilver?) and it’s always interesting to see how an author chooses to portray the vampire world.
Some things don’t work in this book, like how much the main character was dependent on someone else to even have a possibility to win the trials. And how in the world her dad who sees her as very fragile even would believe she could succeed. I didn’t really get the living situation in the competition and how little interactions they had with the other contestants outside of the competitions. But I think the way the competitions were structured and that they actually had a big part of the story made sense. The ending made me a bit annoyed but I’m not sure how I would make sense of having it different with all this buildup. I guess I’ll have to continue to the next book in the series.
The Ashes & the Star-Cursed King didn’t hook me the same way the first book in the series did. I thought that it was a good continuation in the series and I really liked that they made it a duology instead of a trilogy. I did enjoy it though and am glad that I read it. The next book in the series follows a different main character, I haven’t decided yet if I want to give it a go. For now I am satisfied with this dose of the world.
I picked up Som i en countrylåt (Como en una canción country) because the premise sounded cute (I wanted to give another cowboy book a go) and because it was written originally in Spanish. I was sadly a little disappointed. It felt like this was a draft to a book that didn’t get a chance to bloom out, it had potential to be a bit more. One thing that I thought a little extra on while reading was the way it changed perspectives between characters midway chapters, I thought it was a bit clever done but I think some readers might find it a bit confusing.
It is time for another round of Down the TBR-hole, where I go through the books in my To Be Read shelf on Goodreads and try to decide if I still want to read them (should they stay) or not (should they go?).
Eat Like a Gilmore: Daily Cravings – Cristi Carlson I have a soft spot for cookbooks. I still need to try more recipes from the first Gilmore Girls cookbook but I kinda want to read this one as well. Verdict: Stays
Whiskey in a Teacup – Reese Witherspoon I actually have this at home now, borrowed from the library. I should really start reading it before I have to return it. Verdict: Stays
Fire on High – Elizabeth Acevedo I think I actually had this one home from the library and started it but got sidetracked. It wasn’t bad so I still aim to read this one. Verdict: Stays
Smitten – Janet Evanovich I don’t remember how this happened to land here. Was it available at my audiobook service? Did I want to try something else that this author had written, other than the Stephanie Plum series? It is available at my audiobook service, maybe I should give it a go and see how it is. Verdict: Stays
A Study in Charlotte – Brittany Cavallard I’m a little torn but it’s available at both the library and my audiobook account so I might as well give it a go. Verdict: Stays
How did it go this time? Books in the TBR shelf at start: 240 Number of staying books: 11 Number of leaving books: 1 Total amount of leaving books: 55 Number of reserved books at the library: 0 Number of books put in to-borrow-shelf: 1 Number of books added to audiobook-account: 2 Current amount of books in my TBR shelf: 263
I keep saying that I need to do these more recurring so that I actually can see the decrease when I remove books. I have been more restrictive in adding books to my TBR though because I know it will increase it. Not many left the shelf this time but I see it as a good sign that I’ve been adding books that I am interested in reading.
I’ve read a few more books! Here’s a few thoughts.
I’ve seen Quicksilver around for a while and when I saw it as one of the books in a quest on Pagebound, I decided to give it a try. It was available as both ebook and audiobook so I switched a bit between the two. I haven’t really made up my mind about this one yet. If feels like the plot exploded towards the end, too many things happening in a short time. I did have a fun time reading it but I’m not sure I should look too closely at the plot and turns, it might not hold up as much. Not sure I’m going to continue the series, I’ve no idea in which direction it’s going to go now. Maybe if I remember enough when I potentially get to the sequel.
I quickly reserved Maid for Each Other when I saw that the library had it. A fake dating story often intrigues me. This was exactly what I wanted, it was the right time for this book and me. I really like that we jump right into the story, without having the typical 50 page buildup with things we already know from the backside of the book. It’s a sweet and a little ridiculous story. I read it almost in one sitting, I didn’t want to put it down. I’m curious to see what else this author has to offer.
Don’t want to stop reading this series! Bad combination of cliffhanger and having to go to work. I’m way too invested in this series now, haha. A Business Proposal, volume 3, I have 7 volumes to go!
Four jealous men in A Business Proposal, volume 4? Come on! Not for the same woman at least. Am still entertained and this one brought on a fun twist to the story, I wondered how they were going to be able to keep it up for all 10 volumes like this but I think I got the answer.
I have started the reading year strong, many things I’ve enjoyed reading so far! Can’t wait to see what’s up next.
At the start of a year I always get an extra boost in my reading and blogging, excited to get to everything. Since doing the statistics for 2025, I have been pondering how I want to steer my reading for 2026.
On one hand, I’m excited to get to books that been gifted from friends and family and to pick books from my TBR har and to read quests on Pagebound. I want to make big ambitious goals. On the other hand, I don’t want to commit to something like that for a whole year. Maybe this year will be all about the pleasure of reading and if I do the other things, that’s fun!
So, the first goal I have is to read instead of scrolling. I want to reduce my social media time (the scrolling part of it) and increase the reading. I have access to my ebooks on my phone, so why not read a little instead – or perhaps blog a little?
The next goal is read 75 books (novels, novellas, graphic novels and short stories). That’s the official goal. My unofficial is 100 books, it would be cool to be back there. If I succeed in the first goal, perhaps this unofficial one might too. I’m not going to stress about it though, I’ll read as much as I read.
My third goal is to mood reader more. I have always been a mood reader but I think that I want to embrace it a little more. It might be tricky to measure this but if I feel like reading something else, I should probably do that. I read more if I pick up what I’m feeling instead of trying to finish what I’m reading before I go on. I think this will be a tricky one at times.
I will slip in one more goal. Read at least one book that isn’t written in Swedish or English as the original language. Maybe also except Korean, because I know a few graphic novels from Korean will be read in the coming weeks (a package with four volumes of A Business Proposal is waiting for pickup as we speak). Looking at the numbers from last year, the majority of books had English as original language and it would be fun to have a couple of books from other places around the world in the logs this year.
All the book statistics, thinking of reading and actively trying to read instead of scrolling Instagram gave me a reading boost and I have flown through a couple of books already.
At New Year’s Day, I said to myself “you don’t have to finish that other book, just read what you are in the mood for!” And I immediately picked up Blind Date with a Warewolf that I’ve been longing for since it came out. It’s a collection of short stories of dates that Asil (from the Alpha & Omega series) are challenged to go on. I devoured it! I really missed this world.
Next up, I read The Cycle Syncing Handbook. Basically it says that you should listen to your body and that you don’t have the same need throughout the month. It was an interesting read and even though I don’t think I will start living differently, it gave me a couple of things to think about. I might come back to this one and return to different parts of the book and see how I think it aligns with me.
After spending some time in the Alpha & Omega world, I wanted more so I continued with Wild Sign. It’s the sixth book in the series and in this one we get to know more about Leah. Really enjoyed this one!
I’ve tested out a book tracking app called Pagebound and they have different quests you can join. I joined a few where I already had read a bunch and then I joined a quest with cowboy romances, apparently that was something I felt I needed to tryout. First up in that quest: Done and Dusted. I liked it as a whole. I liked the plot, sweetness, horses and thought that the third act conflict was just small enough (not one of those big ones where I have to pause the book for several weeks before coming back). I didn’t like the possessiveness though and how different the main characters were in the intimate scenes versus the whole story, felt like different people? I preferred the main story personalities. I haven’t decided yet which cowboy book will be next in the quest, we’ll see what the mood reader in me feels like.
My current reads are plenty, I have no idea which book will be finished next. have you read anything good recently?
I pondered a little of what kind of stats I could include here that wasn’t just a repeat of the trimestral posts. I started to summarise my reading in a Google sheet and I might have gone overboard. I could generate diagrams and everything! Prepare for a long post.
In total, I read 79 novels, novellas, short stories, graphic novels and poetry. My two busiest reading month were July (unusual that I read so much during my time off) and December. I had a total average rating of 3.34 and an average book length of 309 pages. Grain of salt of the book pages, I had to try to convert the audiobooks to pages somehow.
My book collection grew with 18 books, and I read 15 from my own shelf that previously were unread, resulting in a growth of unread books by +3.
Book acquired
The majority of my books were aqcuired from my audiobook service. Even though the percentage is quite low on the library, I think it has increased a bit from previous years. I’m getting back to the library!
Book format
A non-surprising connection from book acquired to book format is that the audio and ebooks takes the biggest chunk, since I have access to both audio and ebooks on my audiobook service and can sometimes switch between them seamlessly.
Book genres
It was a bit tricky to divide them into only one genre each but in either case, fantasy was the winner here.
I read 68% in English and 32% in Swedish.
Original languages
The origin language of the books were mainly English. At the very end of the year, I read two graphic novels translated from Koren which entered a new language. Spoiler alert: we’re going to see more of this in 2026, I have eight more volumes to go.
78.5% were books in a series and 21.5% were standalone. I thought a while about how to do this one, because some of these series are books that really are interconnected books with different main characters but can be read as standalones, but ended up putting them in series since I thus far have chosen to read them in series order rather than as standalone books.
Series that I read the most from were: Mercy Thompson by Patricia Briggs (5), The Good Guys by Eric Ugland (5) and Innkeeper Chronicles by Ilona Andrews (5). I were going to list top authors also but you also see them in this same list.
15% of the books I read were re-reads and 35% were authors I’ve never read from before.
Original publication years I read from the most were 2023 (7), 2021 (6), 2024 (6) and 2019 (4). What pleasantly surprised me was that I read 3 books from 1953, two of these were picked for the work book circle without us realising beforehand that they were published the same year.
The final count for my different time blocks: – 1919: 1 1920-1939: 4 1940-1959: 8 1960-1979: 3 1980-1999: 9 2000-2019: 28 2020-2025: 25
The final ambitious thing I decided to add to my book list was how much money I saved by not buying books. I here tried to find what it would have cost me to buy the book that I borrowed from the library or listen/read from my audiobook service. Here I removed the monthly cost from my audiobook subscription. I was perhaps not completely consistent in how I chose the price to count. Sometimes I did listen to an audiobook that I already own a physical copy and therefore picked what it would have cost to buy the audiobook. In some cases, I picked the the physical book even though I listened to it because if I would have bought it, I wouldn’t have bought the audiobook. And, in some cases, there was only one option to choose from regardless of format. It did total into 5842 SEK (about 544,5 Euro or 635,55 USD according to Google’s converter at time of writing this post).
Did I accomplish my 2025 reading goals?
Read 50 books – this one is both yes and no. I set the goal lower to give room for thicker books and at least one book in German. I did exceed the number by 29 so I did accomplish reading 50, but I didn’t read what I gave room for so maybe just a half tick on this goal.
Read at least two of my thickest books – at that time I had an list of books that I would tick off. I finished none on that list, I did start one though and spend a lot of time reading it in January.
Read one book in German – no, not even started one.
Make a Tetris blanket – not sure how much this was a goal and how much this was just an idea and project, I’ll include a summary of it anyhow. I’m sure I was very ambitious at the start of the year and thought that I would finish this with no problem. Didn’t think about that each book would generate 4 squares and that I might read more than intended. Life happened which put the project on a bit of a pause. I made 93 squares and have 107 to go. I have started blocking and attaching at the same time to avoid getting stuck in one task. I’ll give you the occational update on the blanket to let you know how it’s going.
While putting these statistics together, I’ve been playing around what my goals for 2026 will be. Some of these numbers inspired me to look in other areas this coming year. In 2025 I looked a lot at original publication year to get different squares for the blanket, in 2026 I’ll still keep track but I don’t think it’ll impact my reading choises as much. I’ll give it some more thoughts and have a separate post for that soon.
Do you keep track of what you are reading or just go with the flow?
Borrowed from library: 5 Self-owned: 5 Audiobook service: 19
English: 22 Swedish: 7 German: 0
Average rating: 3.28
How are the book goals coming along? Read at least two of my thickest books: 0 Read fewer books to take time to the thick ones: 79/50 Read at least one book in German: 0
The Case of the Waylaid Wolf was the last book I counted for the book blanket. After this, I did not think about when the books were published but I still kept track. Before 1920: 0 1920-1939: 0 1940-1959: 3 1960-1979: 0 1980-1999: 1 2000-2019: 14 2020-2025: 11
My unread book collection growed with 4 books over this time period, and a total of 3 over the whole year. I really used my audio book service this month. Averall I am quite pleased with the last couple of reading months, I am suprised I got that much read.
Books I rated 4 or 5 stars (in the order I read them): The Case of the Waylaid Wolf – Erle Stanley Gardner The Grift of the Magi – Ally Carter Frost Burned – Patricia Briggs (reread) Night Broken – Patricia Briggs (reread) A Business Proposal, vol. 1 – Haehwa, Narak A Business Proposal, vol. 2 – Haehwa, Narak Yes, My Accent is Real – Kunal Nayyar
Have You Read This One? 