July was a great month for reading, but not so much for blogging… I participated in the #24in48 Readathon and read a whopping 15 books in one weekend, which is more than I’ve been averaging PER MONTH all year, and the #SummerOfPLL readalong has also boosted my reading, so I’ve got QUITE a list of books I read last month.
Reads for July
Here’s all I read in July:
Pretty Little Liars by Sara Shepard — 4 of 5 stars
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid — 5 of 5 stars
Flawless by Sara Shepard — 3 of 5 stars
The Astonishing Color of After by Emily X.R. Pan — 5 of 5 stars
Perfect by Sara Shepard — 3 of 5 stars
Unbelievable by Sara Shepard — 3 of 5 stars
Maudlin Towers: Curse of the Werewolf Boy by Christ Priestley (ARC) — 4 of 5 stars — review here!
Wicked by Sara Shepard — 3 of 5 stars
Killer by Sara Shepard — 3 of 5 stars
Heartless by Sara Shepard — 2 of 5 stars
Ghost Boys by Jewell Parker Rhodes — 5 of 5 stars
The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon by Stephen King — 4 of 5 stars
Trapped in Death Cave by Bill Wallace — 3 of 5 stars
A Study in Scarlet by Arthur Conan Doyle — 4 of 5 stars
Summer of Salt by Katrina Leno — 4 of 5 stars
Nice Try, Jane Sinner by Lianne Oelke — 5 of 5 stars
1984 by George Orwell — 3 of 5 stars
Dear Rachel Maddow by Adrienne Kisner — 5 of 5 stars
From a Buick 8 by Stephen King — 3 of 5 stars
Wild Beauty by Anna-Marie McLemore — 4 of 5 stars
Lizzie by Dawn Ius — 4 of 5 stars
When Dimple Met Rishi by Sandhya Menon — 5 of 5 stars
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald — 4 of 5 stars
From Twinkle, With Love by Sandhya Menon — 5 of 5 stars
The Outsider by Stephen King — 5 of 5 stars
Wanted by Sara Shepard — 4 of 5 stars
Twisted by Sara Shepard — 1 of 5 stars
The Cats Came Back by Sofie Kelly (ARC) — 4 of 5 stars
Ruthless by Sara Shepard — 2 of 5 stars
Nevermoor: The Trials of Morrigan Crow by Jessica Townsend — 5 of 5 stars
Reading stats:
- Number of books read: 30
- Number of nonfiction books: 0
- Number of ARCs: 2
- Number of books by marginalized authors: ~8
- Number of library books: 11
Considering that I only read 11 books in June, I am SHOCKED by the number of books I managed to read in July. I wish I could have had more marginalized authors in my reading last month, but a third of my reading was from #SummerOfPLL and I made a concentrated effort to complete or work on some of my DayZero reading goals during #24in48, so I’m not that surprised. I’ll just need to work on that a little harder.
On The Personal Side…
I’ve surprisingly been exercising regularly this month! I’ve been going to yoga classes and water exercise classes, and I’ve actually been enjoying them and looking forward to going. This is weird because I usually hate exercise! I think it probably helps that the temperature has been pretty regularly close to 95 degrees Fahrenheit for most of the month, so going to the indoor pool has felt like a treat. I haven’t been swimming in ages, but I’ve been really happy that I’ve been going.
I also have been driving my car! For how weird getting a car on a short timeline in an unconventional way while still not having my license is, I am really happy that I have my car because I just really love it. I’ve only found one downside to this situation: walking past my car to go to the bus to get groceries, and then walking past my car again with an armload of grocery bags. I take the bus to work and back almost every single day and that doesn’t bother me, but the grocery thing is mildly irritating. I’m getting better at driving, though, and while I usually don’t get to practice more than once a week I’ve actually gotten to practice three times this week! I’m getting much better, and I’m happy with my progress.
I’ve got at LOT of ARCs on my plate (again) and because I did a poor job of reading ARCs in July, I’m going to be doing #ARCAugust this month in an attempt to catch back up again! We’ll see how that goes — I’ve got a lot to read!
Benni Loves Books 