#2024 reading recap

[thepaige-turner]

What a year! Here's hoping 2025 brings more excellent stories!

[dailypokemoncrochet]

Daily Pokemon Crochet Recap 2024

I love those little yearly recaps so I did one for this project!

[xiaq]

Favorite fantasy series: The Folk of the Air. I do NOT understand the hate this series gets on booktok/IG. The world-building is immaculate, the politics are juicy, the writing is engaging, and the romance is a slow burn that’s secondary to the plot and character development. I will read anything that Holly Black writes.

Favorite sci/fi series: The Murderbot Diaries. These are quick, quippy, and satisfying reads. I would die for Murderbot.

Favorite romance series: Not sure if they count as a series since they’re all standalones in the same universe, but Ali Hazelwood’s books ft. Women in STEM having unrealistic romances gets an A+ from me. If you need easy beach reads with happy endings, go for one of these (Also, the first book started as Star Wars fic; neat!).

Favorite graphic novel series: I’ve been following the Heartstopper webcomic for years, but I finally purchased/ re-read the print books this year. If you want sweet, nostalgic writing with diverse queer representation and whimsical art, Heartstopper is for you. If you want a historical/educational story, I highly recommend the Marchseries, which is an autobiographical view of the civil rights movement by John Lewis. 

Favorite historical romance: I know I’m not supposed to judge a book by it’s cover, but I put off reading A Lady for a Duke despite rave reviews because I simply did not vibe with the cover. This was a terrible choice. I read this book in one euphoric sitting and then re-read it two additional times this year. The banter! The pining! The drama! 

Favorite fantasy: A Taste of Gold and Iron and its follow-up short novella Tadek and the Princess. These books may have changed my brain chemistry. I loved this world and its characters and the novella made me cry like a baby.

Favorite science fiction: The Martian. I’d read this before but I re-read it on a work trip and fell in love all over again. Such an excellent science-y sci/fi book that nonetheless feels very approachable and fun.

Favorite non-fiction: They Were Her Property is the driest book I read this year but the content was fascinating (and horrifying). If you want to interrogate your perception of white women’s role in slavery (and, to a lesser degree, the role of Christianity therin) — take your time, and be ready to adjust your worldview—especially if you think Gone with the Wind was an accurate portrayal of the south. How to Survive a Plague, on the other hand, is less dry—you can tell a journalist wrote it—but it’s very detailed. It’s rare that I don’t finish a book in one or two sittings, but this took me over a month. If you’ve ever wondered about the social history of the AIDS epidemic and how a diagnosis went from a quick death sentence to an easily manageable condition (and how hard grassroots movements had to work to get some fucking help to make that happen), this is for you.

Favorite comic: Infidel. Damn. The art. The narrative. So short but so impactful. This is horror, so be mindful.

Favorite graphic novel: This is a tossup between If You’ll Have Me, a sugary-sweet sapphic romance, and The Prince and the Dressmaker which is an equally adorable story about expressing ones true self regardless of social expectations.

Favorite WTF: Butcher and Blackbird and Bride. I’m still not sure how I feel about B&B but it was certainly an interesting way to spend two hours. Bride is on the list purely because reading the word “knot” on a print page instead of an AO3 tab felt illegal.

Favorite feel-good/comedy: Monstrous Regiment. I’ve read this book so many times and, after the election, I read it again. I doubt any other book will surpass what has become an emotional support story for me.

Favorite YA: Cemetery Boys (Magic! Mystery! Queerness!) She Drives me Crazy(Athletics! Misunderstandings! Enemies to lovers! Queerness!), and A Little Bit Country (Country music! Thinly veiled Dolly Parton references! Queerness!) (Hm. Seems to be a theme here).

Favorite Sports Romance: Icebreaker (the Graziadei one, not the Hannah Grace one). You know how a lot of hockey books (my own included) can be light on the actual hockey? Not the case with Icebreaker. The character development was lovely, but the hockey was divine. Graziadei clearly knows and loves the sport.

Favorite historical fiction: What the Wind Knows (Mystery! Time Traveling! Love! Ireland!) and Kindred (Mystery! Time Traveling! Love! The Antebellum South!).

Favorite Space Odyssey: Gideon + Nona the Ninth. I had to make a special category because neither sci/fi nor fantasy feels appropriate for this yet incomplete series which is as rollicking good fun as it is completely confounding. I still have no idea what’s happening but I can’t wait to read the next one.

Favorite pleasant surprise: A Court of Mist and Fury. I waited so long to read the ACOTAR series because I got such conflicting reports from folks. I took the advice of a reader I trust and powered through the first book. ACOMAF was worth the contextualizing journey. I loved it. I’m still working through the rest of the series but this book was an unexpected joy.

Least favorite book: Lol, no. We don’t play that game here.

[winterxgardener]

This blog post is mostly about Courtney and Shayne’s moments in 2024. If you're not a fan, just scroll up or down 😅. Anyway, Happy New Year to everyone in this community! 💚💙

January

They celebrated their last New Year as an engaged couple.

February

The Smosh cast and crew threw an intimate bachelor/bachelorette party for them.

March

It is the month that mostly Shourtney fans lose their minds. Well done on making one of the best ways to hard launch a relationship.

April

They threw a second wedding reception for their closest friends.

May

Giving their blood, sweat, and tears for Smosh Sitcom Live. Kudos to Courtney for directing the trailer, and to Shayne, who pitched and co-wrote the script. (with Syd and Olivia- they should be part of Smosh imo)

June

They celebrated Courtney's birthday—just the two of them, being happy, enjoying their staycation, and reading ACOTAR.

[corpsepng]

Part 1 of 2 !

[bibliophilecats]

My year 2024 in books

Though, YA is not a genre (and lgbtqia+ only when you squint), so there is actually "contemporary" missing from that list.

I have read

29 adult novels

16 YA novels

6 middle grade novels and

5 non-fiction books.

Also 25 of my 56 books were from the library (wow!).

Generally, I am not so happy with the big percentage of digital books (it means I am not reading the books I already own) but that is due to the high percentage of library books, so at least I did not buy them.

[tightjeansjavi]

Reflections for 2024

So, this year…it’s been a lot, yeah?

I feel like I have been on this constant ebb and flow of emotions all year. I have spent more times crying and struggling with my sense of self and purpose, than the time I have spent living.

This isn’t to say that there haven’t been good moments, because there have been, I just feel incredibly lost in life.

I have this melancholy feeling when it comes to my space here, within not just one community, but multiple. This is no one’s fault, as we’re all constantly changing—for the better, or for the worst. That is just what happens in life. I have gone from primarily writing Joel x reader and mostly smut, to stepping away from reader all together and writing original character inserts instead.

I don’t regret making this change because there were moments where I was forgetting who I was writing for: myself. I believe I am not alone in this feeling because we, as humans, seek validation whether we are open to admitting it or not. (There is nothing wrong with wanting to feel validated and appreciated)

But I personally struggled with accepting the fact that I did seek that validation through my writing. Numbers don’t matter—but who are we really fooling? When a fic of mine did well, man, I felt like I was invincible. And I think that feeling consumed me, truly. (Inflated ego. I won’t deny it)

and then there was the guilt—the guilt of not posting as much, not interacting on the same level as I once was. I felt guilty if I let something sit in my inbox for too long or if I didn’t answer a comment right away (if at all) and guilt harbors feelings of negativity. This is when I found myself beginning to stray from writing and being in this community all together. (There’s more, but I’m not going to rehash every detail) and I contemplated deactivating all together, but I could never push that button, which, maybe makes me a coward because in the grand scheme of things, this is just an app. It’s a silly little hellsite, but it’s more than that. It means something to me. And the thought of losing that part of myself made me feel sick.

I did realize that I needed to make a change, and so I took some time away from this space, came back, left again and I didn’t feel an ounce of guilt. I stopped checking to see if mutuals were in fact still my mutuals. I stopped worrying if people liked me, I stopped thinking about the things I have no control of, and once I made that change, I started to feel a lot better.

And now, well, I feel indifferent, but also at peace? I don’t know how to conceptualize my feelings into one sentence, but what I can say is that I feel a lot better than I did around this time last year.

I cannot promise that I will ever revisit x reader, but I don’t see myself giving up on writing. I’m still working on my Marcus Acacius fic which I actually intend to hopefully turn into a book (fingers crossed) it’s truly challenged me as a writer, and has forced me to stick with something for a period of time and not just recklessly abandon like my graveyard of WIPS 🪦

Anyway, I have so much love for you all, truly. Thank you for reading my stories, and listening to me yap, and have my moments, and continue to love me, because maybe you see apart of yourselves in me, and my characters. Or you just relate to my human experience. Whatever the reason may be, I’m forever grateful.

I wish you all warm holiday season, and a happy new year.

-Gi

[accidentalspaceexplorer]

August Monthly Recap:

August was a pretty chill month for me, all things considered, and that meant I spent a lot of time playing games and watching TV and being on vacation, not as much reading books. I read 13 books in August, of which Broken Homes was my favorite (I'm glad I finally got back to the Rivers of London series, I'm really enjoying them!).

The Traitor Queen by Danielle L. Jensen: 4/5

Joyful: The Surprising Power of Ordinary Things to Create Extraordinary Happiness by Ingrid Fetell Lee: 3.5/5

Grit by Elizabeth Hunter: 4/5

The Labyrinth Gate by Kate Elliott: 4.25/5

Sweet by Elizabeth Hunter: 4.25/5

Lady Elizabeth's Comet by Sheila Simonson: 4.25/5

The Night Off by Meghan O'Brien: 4.25/5

Provenance by Ann Leckie: 4/5

Devil's Gun by Cat Rambo: 3.5/5

Moon Over Soho by Ben Aaronovitch: 4.25/5

Whispers Under Ground by Ben Aaronovitch: 4.5/5

Broken Homes by Ben Aaronovitch: 4.75/5

The Ghost Brigades by John Scalzi: 4.25/5

Update on yearly goals under the cut:

Complete series: -2 for the year (+1)

Catch up on backlists: 27 (+1)

Read FIYAH/Nebula/Hugo finalists & awards: 9 books (+1)

Read down TBR: at end of August it’s 1546 (-4!!! for the first time it's going down!!!!! I started doing a thing where I sample books that are only available digitally at my library to see if I actually want to read them and it's working!!!)

Read old top-of-TBR list: 4 (+1)

[bloody-wonder]

starting new series

in order to balance my reading i like to track the progress i'm making with old series vs how many new series i'm starting. my loose goal is usually to finish/catch up on at least five and start at least ten new series in a year - which turns out isn't as difficult as it sounds bc we're not even halfway through the year yet and i already hit the latter mark! here's an overview of what i read and my opinions :)

series that were so good i immediately read all the books available:

doctrine of labyrinths by sarah monette (book one: mélusine). okay so this was life-changing. not sarah monette inventing dark aroace romantasy in 2005! they hated her for her slay so much she had to start writing cozy fantasy under a pen name! this story is so weird and unique i honestly have no idea how to pitch it except to say that fans of books like the locked tomb, mdzs and captive prince will very likely enjoy it too. the fact that it's not a depraved booklr cult classic by now is a travesty. but we can still make it happen so if you fall into this particular reader category (and wouldn't be put off by the fact that someone may or may not want to fuck his brother a little bit) please do yourself a favor and read this series! check the trigger warnings first tho

the cemeteries of amalo by katherine addison (book one: the witness for the dead). i liked the goblin emperor, didn't love it, but after binging doctrine of labyrinths in less than a week i sorely needed a cure for my book hangover so i decided to pick up this spinoff series and wouldn't you know it - i binged it too lol. ig february was my monette/addison era. amalo felt like course correction after the goblin emperor and, while it's set in the same world and written in the same tone as that book, many of its aspects reminded me more of doctrine of labyrinths which is probably why i ended up liking it more - and was surprised by that too since i typically don't like this slow meditative writing style in fantasy but ig sarah monette just brings a certain je ne sais quoi to her books (emotional whump). the third book is coming out next march and i'm very excited to see what the saddest gay priest detective will do next👀

the stolen heir duology by holly black. to be completely honest i don't think these books are necessary. ig it was cool to return to elfhame several years post tfota and see some of my favorite ya fantasy characters from outsider pov but i found the main couple quite bland, especially in the second book where they are predictably overshadowed by jude & cardan in every respect. jude & cardan are simply The Power Couple, i love them and i appreciated the opportunity to revisit them in their 20s. madoc, everyone's favorite worst dad, has some nice scenes too but apart from that this installment was neither adventurous nor action-packed nor particularly romantic. it's clear now that holly black plans to continue writing in the elfhame universe and i sincerely hope she will try to shake things up by going full adult and/or changing the genre (i have this galaxybrain idea of a wwdits style mockumentary about madoc's exile in the human world which i'm trying to telepathically plant in holly black's brain as we speak)

evander mills by lev a. c. rosen (book one: lavender house). lavender house was the first book i read this year - i picked it up on a whim, honestly not expecting much, but ended up liking it a lot. in many respects it's a pretty basic closed circle murder mystery but with an all queer cast, whereas the second book has our gay detective investigating blackmail. the fact that the story takes place in the (homophobic) 50s and the queer victims are not protected by the law whatsoever adds an interesting spin to the whole idea of seeking and serving justice. i never thought i'm a serialized detective story type of person but ig if you make it queer enough i'll read anything lol so now i'm eagerly awaiting the next andy mills mystery which will come out in fall.

series i'm maybe going to continue reading later:

aubrey & maturin by patrick o'brian (book one: master and commander). seeing all the old man yaoi on a boat memes on tumblr rapidly propelled this series to the top of my tbr. now i have finally read the first book and,, liked it? lol idk the prose was very good, aubrey & maturin's friendship was sweet and the reading experience was cozy, with funny moments here and there, but overall i wasn't gripped by the plot nor did i particularly connect to the characters. i'm glad i read it but rn i'm not planning to continue this (extremely long) series any time soon. the book did have a delightful nautical atmosphere tho so there's a chance i might return to aubrey & maturin's adventures one day, if the mood strikes

page & sommers by cat sebastian (book one: hither, page). this one i didn't like at all tbh. i think cat sebastian just isn't the author for me and i should quit trying to read her books. however, i am both blessed and plagued by completionism and this series only has two books so i might read the second one this year just to appease my demons lol

series i'm not going to continue:

adam binder by david r. slayton (book one: white trash warlock). someone on tumblr recced this book to me ages ago and i wanted to read it ever since - purely bc of the title tbh😅 something i failed to consider tho is that urban fantasy is probably my least favorite subgenre of fantasy. and this book unfortunately didn't feature any memorable character moments or mind-blowing plot bits that could have broken through my unimpressedness with the urban fantasy setting🤷‍♀️

rook & rose by m. a. carrick (book one: the mask of mirrors). okay now we're entering the Dislike & Disappoint territory. i got interested in this series bc i heard it being compared to gentleman bastard but the similarities end at the renaissance venice setting and a conperson protagonist. the mask of mirrors completely lacks the rizz and swagger of scott lynch's writing and its characters just don't have the oomph of locke lamora and his team. so that was disappointing. on top of that the book is extremely long and convoluted with a worldbuilding that bothered me a lot and i couldn't put my finger on why until i read the themes section on its wiki page - ah yes, the us politics, again, using a foreign setting as a window dressing, again. listen, ik the us politics are important for the us authors to write about but when i pick up a book inspired by the italian renaissance what i want to get is themes and motifs representative of that time and place, even if we modernize them by (honestly lackluster) queernormativity and gender equality. i was mildly curious about the identity of the rook but now that it's been revealed i see no reason to continue this series.

the masquerade by seth dickinson (book one: the traitor baru cormorant). i intended to finish this book last year and leave it there but it was so unbelievably boring it put me into a reading slump for like two whole weeks and i ended up finishing it in january. i noticed that books about colonialism often try so hard to strike this solemn literary tone and say something profound that characters and plot just get bulldozed over by that dedication to conveying this very serious theme. admittedly, baru isn't as bad as that - i'm just biased bc she was pitched to me as a character in the same category as lymond and tyrion lannister so i was disappointed on that account seeing as it was the only reason i decided to give this book a try. i will say the general concept of the story and the plot twist at the end were indeed good but the overall reading experience was so aggressively meh that they just weren't worth it for me and so when the Big Thing happened i was still underwhelmed.

emily wilde by heather fawcett (book one: emily wilde’s encyclopaedia of faeries). i wrote a long ass goodreads review about why i disliked this book so much but let's see if i can be concise for once (ha, as if). i'm a big fan of olivia atwater's books so based on all the buzz around emily wilde i thought i was picking up a similar faerie story. turns out this was more like an "elevated" cozy fantasy version of ali hazelwood's books featuring howl in leather pants (tweed pants?). where atwater uses faerie tale tropes and fae lore to explore classism, neurodivergence and nuanced romantic and platonic connections, fawcett seems to write from a perspective that is decidedly normative. just like emily wilde, half a soul has a heroine who reads as neurodivergent but the narrative is always firmly on her side, whereas the moral in emily wilde seems to be that she has to smile and socialize more or smth. just like emily wilde, a thousand stitches features a faerie as a love interest but in this case he indeed reads like a whimsical magical being, so similar to humans and yet so different at the same time, whereas mr cheap howl knockoff reads like a quirky human man who is an asshole sometimes and can do magic. atwater's books are fairly popular but emily wilde is the book that has mass appeal and ig i shouldn't really be surprised bc when have the stories that question the status quo ever have been more popular than the ones that reinforce it? so i'm not really surprised but i am bitter. this book left a sour taste in my mouth and made me feel really bad about myself which was something i hadn't reckoned with when i picked up this cozy fantasy. tbh i initially was going to masochistically read the sequel out of morbid curiosity but then i remembered that i can read literally anything else instead lol the hater gods spared me just for once😅

2024 reading updates | goodreads

[vanebookrecs]

My 2024 Book Recap! I read a total of 22 books in 2024 and that was honestly a huge accomplishment for me. Hopefully, some of my previous reviews on some of these books will encourage you to read them!

[spiritedstars]

May Reads 📖

Forced Bonds (The Bonds That Tie #4) by J.Bree - 4/5

Tragic Bonds (The Bonds That Tie #5) by J.Bree - 4/5

Unbroken Bonds (The Bonds That Tie #6) by J.Bree - 4/5

This Woven Kingdom (#1) by Tahereh Mafi - 4/5

The Au Pair Affair (ARC) by Tessa Bailey - 1.5-2/5

I absolutely ate up The Bonds That Tie series and really loved it; such good fun! This Woven Kingdom was so beautifully written and I'm currently on book two now so hoping the story stays interesting because I enjoyed it. As for that last one...I think I'm going to just break away from Tessa Bailey. Her old stuff was better but the last few releases have been nothing but a disappointment.

[bigheartedbibliophile]

✨ 2024 Reading Wrapped ✨

I list my top books of each month, the mood map for the year, and all the books I read for the year! My favorites of the year were Heir of Fire by @sarahjmaas (in case you've never heard of it 😜) and You've Reached Sam by @thedustinthao . I can never pick just one. I can't wait to see what my 2025 reading wrapped will look like! Hopefully, I'll finish the Throne of Glass series, lol.

[b00kkat]

K's Book-Recap of 2024

🔷Thomas Mann: Buddenbrooks

🔷Hermann Melville: Moby Dick

🔷Homer: Ilias (englich title: Iliad)

🔷Homer: Odyssee (Odessey)

🔷Terry Pratchett & Neil Gaiman: Ein gutes Omen (Good Omens)

🔷Ashley Herring Blake: Delilah Green Doesen't Care

🔷Caroline Criado-Perez: Unsichtbare Frauen (Invisible Women)

🔷Louisa May Alcott: Little Women

🔷Taylor Jenkins Reid: Daisy Jones & the Six

🔷J. R. R. Tolkien: Das Silmarillion (The Silmarillion)

🔷Friedrich Dürrenmatt: Die Physiker (The Physicists) (not pictured)

🔷Casey McQuiston: The Pairing

🔷Lana Harper: Rise And Devine

[rasheednewsonauthor]

MY FAVORITE BOOKS OF THE YEAR!

[bibliophilecats]

[pamithebunterfly2007]

Since 2024 is about to be over and now since we’re heading to 2025, Just take a look of all the creations I’ve did the whole year.