2023 Mid-Year Reading Update

Now that we are over halfway through 2023, it’s time for a mid-year reading update! I’m going to share with you a few of my highlight reads from the first half of the year, and some updates on challenges I’ve been doing. Overall I’ve had a really good reading year so far. I think as I’ve gotten older, I’ve gotten to know my reading tastes quite well. This translates to generally higher ratings for books, as I do better at picking books to read that I’m pretty confident I will like.

First, let’s start with some general reading updates. These are some update templates that I posted in my stories on my Bookstagram. The first one is the Alphabet Reading Challenge. This is one I just like to track for fun, I don’t usually try too hard to complete it. I just like to see how much of the alphabet I end up filling out with what I read! And if you look, I’m doing pretty dang well! Only 11 letters left, and a lot of them are the hard ones (Q, X, Z) so that’s pretty cool to see.

The second template is a shelf reduction tracker. Every single year I say “THIS year I’ll work on reducing my physical TBR!!!”. And every year I don’t do that well with it hahaha. I thought maybe if I’m faced with the numbers it would motivate me more. The good news is that I haven’t increased very much, buuuuut I also haven’t decreased it. Staying even is pretty good, but during this second half of 2023 I will be trying much harder to actually reduce the number.

The third template shows some brief thoughts about my reads so far. I’ll write a few more thoughts here:

• Best book: Bonesmith (this book ROCKS!!! you can read my review of it here)
• Most surprising: A Broken Blade (came out of nowhere for me, and I super enjoy it)
• Best characters: That Ain’t Witchcraft (this series is long and sometimes changes main characters, so spending a few books with the same characters was great and I love them!)
• Best sequel: A Shadow Crown (the sequel to A Broken Blade, and sooo much was improved upon!! I loved it)
• Most disappointing: Ship Wrecked (it was honestly just meh compared to the other books in the series)
• Best writing: Lost in the Moment and Found (Seanan McGuire killed me with this one! read my review of it here)
• Best new author: Empire of Sand –> Tasha Suri (this was my first Tasha Suri and I loved it, can’t wait to read more of her books!)
• Biggest accomplishment: The Unbroken (an accomplishment in two ways, one that it means I finallyyyyy started reading the sapphic trifecta, and two in that this book is amazing for a debut!)
• Most crowd pleasing: Happy Place (everybody and their mom loves Emily Henry!! including me tbh)

12 Recs From 12 Friends Update

Back in January I talked about some reading challenges that I would be participating in this year. One is the “12 Book Recommendations From 12 Friends“. You can see that page for a longer rundown but basically I had 12 friends pick 12 books from my physical TBR! To encourage me to actually get to reading them. I have not been very successful at this so far haha. Thus far I’ve only managed to read 3 out of 12 books. But I really loved them! So here’s the three I read:

The first book of this challenge that I read was The Unbroken by C.L. Clark, picked for me by Guthrie (@bookwnoname on Instagram). I’m so happy that I finally got around to this one!! The author had some really great conversations about colonialism, colonizers, and what it’s like to grow up as a person from a colonized culture. Obviously frustrating to read from that perspective, but it’s important. I had a few issues with pacing, but otherwise I loved it. Super excited to read the sequel!!

The second book I read was Brotherhood by Mike Chen! This is a Star Wars novel. My friend Corey (@grimdark_dad on Instagram) chose this one for me, since we both have a great love of Star Wars! This book follows an adventure of Obi-Wan and Anakin during the Clone Wars era. I really love this era of SW, and it felt so nostalgic to me. And Obi-Wan is just one of my favorite characters in general. Thanks for the nudge to finally read this Corey!

And most recently I read A Prayer for the Crown-Shy by Becky Chambers. I absolutely LOVED the first book in this novella series, and my friend Steph picked this one for me to read this year. I had been kind of saving it for a time when I really needed it, since I knew it would feel like a hug. And boy, did it. Dex and Mosscap are such great characters, and I love their relationship. I could read about their adventures and discoveries forever probably.

Shimmering Worlds Challenge

This is a reading challenge hosted by a friend of mine (Gagan @afantasysky) on Instagram, and it is focused on reading SFF books by authors of color. Both of the books I mentioned for the previous challenge actually work for this challenge as well! Brotherhood for the prompt of “Non-human characters,” and The Unbroken for the prompt of “Rebels”. I filled the prompt “In a city” with Our Violent Ends, which takes place in Shanghai. The two other prompts I filled were “LGBTQIA+ protagonist” (A Broken Blade) and “It’s magic!” (Song of Silver, Flame Like Night). If any of you have recs for the other prompts, let me know! Would especially appreciate any recs for books by indigenous authors!

How has your reading been so far this year? Are you doing any particular challenges? Any standout reads for you?