2025 kicked off to a strong start in terms of reading and blogging, but then two unexpected events (one good, one bad) caused me me wobble a bit. The good: I got my job back! With six days’ notice, I went back to work on January 20. Work’s looking stable to at least the summer, but my position is somewhat budget-dependent and the budget hasn’t been finalized yet so… we’ll see. The bad: I had an unanticipated emergency come up just a few days before I went to back to work. It took me about a week to deal with it. Luckily there’s no lasting impacts but it did mean I wasn’t able to read or blog during that time. So, January held enough excitement for my entire 2025 lol. I’m anticipating more peaceful time for reading and blogging in Februray, even though I’m back at work full time.
Books Finished
- A Sorceress Comes to Call by T. Kingfisher (adult historical fantasy)
- Max in the House of Spies: A Tale of World War II by Adam Gidwitz (middle grade historical speculative)
- real ones by katherena vermette (adult contemporary)
- Kwame Crashes the Underworld by Craif Kofi Farmer (middle grade fantasy)
- Splinter & Ash by Marieke Nijkamp (middle grade fantasy)
- Sona and the Golden Beasts by Rajani LaRocca (middle grade fantasy)
- Prairie Lotus by Linda Sue Park (middle grade historical)
- Stream Big: The Triumphs and Turmoils of Twitch and the Stars Behind the Screen by Nathan Grayson (adult non-fiction)
- Benji Zeb is a Ravenous Werewolf by Deke Moulton (middle grade speculative)
Books Reviewed
- Prisoner of Ice and Snow by Ruth Lauren (middle grade fantasy)
- The Wolf Wilder by Katherine Rundell (middle grade historical fantasy)
- A Haunting on the Hill by Elizabeth Hand (adult horror)
- Assorted middle grade for 2024 Review Round Up #3:
- 102 Days of Lying About Lauren by Maura Jortner (contemporary)
- Just Lizzie by Karen Wilfrid (contemporary)
- Louder Than Hunger by John Schu (contemporary novel-in-verse)
- The Cookie Crumbles by Tracy Badua and Alechia Dow (mystery)
- Just a Pinch of Magic by Alechia Dow (speculative)
Posts Written
- My annual goal review and goal setting post Wrapping Up 2024, Looking Forward 2025
- Shared thoughts on middle grade historical fiction Prairie Lotus and asked for votes on non-fiction in “I Can’t Believe I Haven’t Read That Yet” #29 (I need a tiebreaker vote so leave a comment if you haven’t already!)
- Listed ten new to me authors that I discovered in 2024 for Top Ten Tuesday
Challenges Check-In
This section tallies up my annual goals. (Posts and views are the only two metrics which are per month.)
- 9/80 books read
- 6/30 middle grade fiction novels
- Mostly finalists for the 2024 Cybils award for elementary/middle grade speculative fiction
- 0/10 owned books
- Wasn’t able to get to any this month, with all the Cybils reading
- 0/9 Family Reads
- I scheduled January to be a ‘rest’ month since I usually have lots of other topics to post about in January.
- 1/4 “I Can’t Believe I Haven’t Read that Yet”
- Reviewed 11% of what I read (goal = 50%)
- This goal will lag behind for a bit, as I review books at least several weeks after I’ve read them
- 7/66 posts in 2025
- 7/6-8 posts in January
- 3,641/2,600 views in January
- My highest viewcount month ever! Maybe I should increase this goal?? I doubt any other month will hit this high, but I will be pleased as punch if each month this year surpasses 3,000 😙
Shared on Bluesky
On My Radar in February
Representation indicated below AFAIK (I haven’t read these books). Please notify me of any errors or places where I can be more specific.
- 4 Feb – Release date of A World Worth Saving by Kyle Lukoff (middle grade speculative, trans boy and Jewish rep), The Ghosts of Bitterfly Bay by Mary Averling (middle grade speculative, Canadian author), and Black Woods Blue Sky by Eowyn Ivey (adult historical fantasy)
- 11 Feb – Release date of It’s All or Nothing, Vale by Andrea Beatriz Arango (middle grade contemporary novel-in-verse, disability rep)
- 18 Feb – Release date of Hungerstone by Kat Dunn (adult historical horror, lesbian rep), Stream Big: The Triumphs and Turmoils of Twitch and the Stars Behind the Screen by Nathan Grayson (adult non-fiction) and Upon a Starlit Tide by Kell Woods (adult historical fantasy)
- I have ARCS of Stream Big and Upon a Starlit Tide s so watch for reviews in the next couple weeks!
- 25 Feb – Release date of Bea Mullins Takes a Shot by Emily Diebert (middle grade contemporary, girl crushing on girl, Canadian author) and Something in the Walls by Emily Pearce (adult horror)
How was your January? What new books, or bookish events, are you looking forward to this month?
Congrats on your job, I hope it lasts. I’d love to read Hungerstone at some point, it sounds so good. Have a great month!
Thank you! 😄 I forgot what Hungerstone was about til I wrote this post… now I’m also excited about it again haha.
Kwame Crashes the Underworld and Max in the House of Spies are both on my TBR list! Maybe one day I will get to them!
That is how I feel about most books on my TBR haha. I’ll share some more thoughts on both once the Cybils winner is announced!
So glad to hear about your job, Jenna. Fingers crossed things continue positively for you. 🤞💖
Thank-you! 😊
hoping for a very restful February for you! But glad to hear you’ve got some stability with work now and hope the budget is sorted soon!
Thank-you!! Taking it one day at a time for now but keeping my fingers crossed for more good news down the road…
Glad you were able to deal with that emergency quickly enough and that it isn’t something that is going to trip you up in the future (fingers crossed). I’m really excited to read A Sorceress Comes to Call. Hope you enjoyed. Had to double check when I saw Hungerstone as an anticipated February read. I thought I had already added it to my TBR. It is one I came across not too long ago and sounds very intriguing. Hope your February goes smoothly.
Thanks Alicia! I’m also still keeping my fingers crossed at this point but I think it’s wholly resolved. A Sorceress Comes to Call was a fun read; I think you’ll like it 🙂 I think Hungerstone was a recent discovery for me as well – I love that style of cover design (classical painting _ bold neon font) but I don’t think I’ve ever read a book with a cover like that! Luckily this one has piqued my interest.
[…] Here’s what I got up to in reading and blogging last month, template courtesy of Jenna @ Falling Letters. […]