END OF THE MONTH REVIEW – September 2017

Since I had a blog tour yesterday, I decided to wait until today to do my end of the month review until today.

Personal Life

September has gone well personally. I’m settling into my job more. I learned a bit about how the finance department works, which helps me know how to prepare my invoices and get them up to the finance department on time so when they go to pay the check, they have my invoices there to verify. It’s also been busier. More shipments of books are coming in so I’m pretty busy most days (NOT complaining. I’d rather be busy than bored).

Work on my room continues. If you read my post a few days ago, you’ll know that this weekend didn’t quite go as planned, so it’s not quite done the way I’d hoped it’d be at the end of the weekend, but oh well. Extra time with my adorable niece and sweet nephew is not a hardship really.

BearsDoingChores-CuteClrs
©Cute Colors

Things I Read/Reviewed During September

I read quite a bit during the month of September, but I didn’t review a lot. A lot of what I read were things that I’ve read before. There were little pockets of stress within the month and when that happens, I want my favorite books so there’s no surprises.  But here’s what I read and reviewed and how many stars they received.

  1. World of the Innocent – Nadine C. Keels – 5 stars
  2. A Christmas PerilJ.A. Hennrikus – 4.5 stars
  3. Body on Baker Street – Vicki Delany – 4 stars
  4. Cat Got Your Secrets – Julie Chase – 4.5 stars
  5. Murder at the River Bend Retirement Resort – Stan Schatt – 4 stars
  6. Vangie Vale and the Corpseless Custard – R.L. Syme – 4 stars
  7. Beware the Orchids – Cynthia Hickey – 4 stars (Read in September, but reviewed Oct. 1)

I also read J.D. Robb’s newest book, “Secrets in Death” but work was busy at the time and I didn’t get a chance to review it. I had other types of posts as well, several book spotlights and a couple of life in general posts.

line of books - some stacked, some standing, some leaning - books are blue, brown, red, green, and yellow
©Graphic Garden

Site Metrics

I didn’t have quite as many visitors this month as I have had in the past, but I think that’s more because I didn’t post a whole lot in September. When work is busy, I don’t have time to post there and then since I’ve been working on my room so hard, I haven’t posted much on the weekends. Total visitors for September was 210. August 2017 was my biggest month of visitors with 263. I did gain quite a few new followers in September. Welcome to all of you new members! 🙂

FallOakLeavesLine

Looking Forward to October

October’s going to be busy for me both in blogging terms and in life terms. I’m not a huge Halloween fan so I don’t generally go all out for that, but I’m a big fall fan so I do the cider mills and pumpkin patches. Second, I’m possibly participating in the attempt to break the world record for the number of women dressed as Rosie the Riveter in one place on the 14th of October. I participated 2 years ago and had a great time, but I don’t really want to go by myself again so I may skip it this time. It’s not as fun when you’re alone. The original Rosie the Riveter worked at the Willow Run Bomber Plant which is here in Ypsilanti, part of which is currently being restored to be a museum. That’s why the record is important around here. Then, the Detroit Institute of Arts is opening two new exhibits. One on Monet who is my favorite painter overall and the reason I have a water garden with a water lily. The second is on Frederic Edwin Church who is my favorite American painter. I’m super excited about those. Finally, I always like to go to the zoo when they give the animals pumpkins to play with. There’s usually treats inside the pumpkins for them and it’s fun to watch them explore and pounce and rip things open.

Blogging-wise

Blogging-wise, I have 6 author interviews, 1 spotlight post, 2 Book Blast posts, 1 Guest Post, and 7 reviews already lined up. Most are part of blog tours, but there are a few that are not.

As you can see, October will be filled with fun and lots of blog posts. Plus, somewhere in there I have to find a way to get the furniture moved that didn’t get moved last weekend! But, I’m looking forward to it all!

 

End of the Month Review – FEBRUARY 2017

Alright, after being sick for a few days, I’m back at it around here. Here’s an update of what I read/reviewed during the month of February.

During the month of February, I read 16 books, wrote 11 reviews (with a 12th in the writing stage), wrote up 1 author interview, had 1 general book/holiday post and participated in 1 blog tour. Of the books I read, 7 were cozy mysteries, 6 were romance books, 2 were non-cozy mysteries, and there was 1 children’s book. The only books I read that I did not review were one book by Agatha Christie, one book I re-read by J.D. Robb (though I’m still thinking about writing a review for that one), and two books I re-read by Nora Roberts. The rest of the books I wrote up reviews for.

I made progress on a few of my reading challenges.

  • Goodreads Challenge 2017 – I’m up to 35 books read out of 175 for my goal.
  • Pages Read Challenge 2017 – I’m up to 10,156 pages so far in 2017. My goal is between 48,001 and 60,000 pages.
  • Ebook Challenge 2017 – I’ve read 16 out of my goal of 50 ebooks for 2017.
  • Craving for Cozies 2017 – I’ve read 22 out of my goal of 80 cozy mysteries for 2017.
  • Read it Again, Sam 2017 – I’ve read 6 out of my goal of 16+ re-reads for 2017.
  • Blogger Shame 2017 – I’ve read 2 out of my goal of 12 books that I’m behind in reviewing. That’s a good start!
  • Library Love 2017 – I’ve read so many library books already this year that I upped my challenge level from level 2 – just 24 books to level 4 – 50+ books. I’ve already read 17 from the library this year!

Since I’ve been sick, I’ve been doing a little re-reading and not reading anything new, but now that I’m feeling better, I’m hoping to get back to reading new things. I have a children’s book that the author asked me to read/review that I want to get done in the next few days as well as others (including an upcoming blog tour post).

Coming up in March, I’m a part of 5 blog tours, so that will keep me somewhat busy. In between those, I hope to get at least one more book done for my Blogger Shame challenge so I can continue getting caught up on those.