I enjoyed the month of October. It was relatively quiet, and I always enjoy giving away buckets of treats for Halloween. Our neighborhood is super popular, and it is always a big event with people setting up tables at the sidewalk to give away goodies to the kids going from house to house. I also went on a trip to visit my in-laws. We haven’t made that trip since before COVID started. So, it was nice to make it over there and see them and our nephew. I got approximately the same amount of reading done as in September, and I met one of my goals for the year, which is super exciting (Hint: It involves NetGalley). All in all, it has been a pretty great month. Now, let’s get down to the specifics.

Books I’ve Read

I set a goal of reading 10 books this month, which you can see below. I almost got all 10 of them read. The only one I didn’t finish was Empire of the Vampire by Jay Kristoff. I liked the book. I just wasn’t in the mood for it at the time. So, I set it down for now and will come back to it another time. These are the nine books I did read from my TBR (the ratings link to my review, if available):

• Soul of the Deep by Natasha Bowen (2⭐)
• Foul Lady Fortune by Chloe Gong (5⭐)
• White Trash Warlock by David R. Slayton (4⭐)
• A Restless Truth by Freya Marske (5⭐)
• The First to Die at the End by Adam Silvera (4⭐)
• Path of Deceit by Tessa Gratton & Justina Ireland (5⭐)
• Paris Daillencourt Is About to Crumble by Alexis Hall (4⭐)
• Jack’s on Fire by Owen Lach (4⭐)
• Ocean’s Echo by Everina Maxwell (5⭐)

I also managed to fit in quite a few books beyond what I set out to read. This brought my total for October up to 18! These are all the books I read in addition to those on my TBR (the ratings link to my review, if available):

• Neon Gods by Katee Robert (4⭐)
• Captive Prince by C.S. Pacat (5⭐)
• Fence: Striking Distance by Sarah Rees Brennan (4⭐)
• The Witch Haven by Sasha Peyton Smith (3⭐)
• The Witch Hunt by Sasha Peyton Smith (3⭐)
• Prince’s Gambit by C.S. Pacat (5⭐)
• A Deadly Education by Naomi Novik (4⭐)
• The Atlas Six by Olivie Blake (5⭐)
• The Atlas Paradox by Olivie Blake (5⭐)

Progress On My 2022 Reading Goals

Goodreads Challenge

I’ve surpassed my goal of 100 books for the year! I read 18 books in October, which brings my total so far for the year up to 159! I don’t plan to set a new goal. Instead, I’m just going to keep reading as much as possible to see how high I can get the number before the end of the year.

NetGalley Progress

I wanted to end the year with at least 50 reviews completed for NetGalley and a feedback ratio of at least 80%. I met my goal of 50 total NetGalley reviews back in April. So, that one is done! In October, I completed another 8 reviews for NetGalley. My ratio increased to 83%! Now I just need to keep it above 80% for the rest of the year…

Read More Nonfiction

There was no nonfiction in my reading in October. I’ve technically already met my goal for the year since I’ve already read more than two nonfiction books, but I’d still like to squeeze in at least one more before 2022 is over.

Read More Comics

I’ve set the goal of reading all the comics I buy during the week I buy them. So…this still hasn’t been happening. I’ve pretty much still abandoned this goal at this point. I’m going to need to think of a more realistic comics goal for next year because I’m super far behind now, and comics have pretty much completely fallen off my blog, which makes me sad because I enjoy them so much.

#BeatTheBacklog

I’m trying to focus on having a majority of the books I read this year be books I bought, borrowed, or received prior to January 1, 2022. In October, only 11% of the books I read were bought, borrowed, or received prior to 2022. That’s even worse than last month’s 17%. I’ve pretty much written off succeeding at this for this year. Instead, I’m going to focus on making sure all of my 2022 ARCs get read by the end of the year, which might also be a stretch.

Finish Some Series

I plan to finish or catch up on the following 5 series by the end of this year:

·  The Broken Earth by N.K. Jemisin

·  Arthurian Saga by Mary Stewart

·  The Extraordinaries by TJ Klune

·  Harry Potter by J. K. Rowling

·  A shit ton of different Shadowhunters books by Cassandra Clare

I didn’t make any progress on Stewart’s or Clare’s series in October, but I’m still on track to finish them by the end of the year. So, I’m not sweating this one too much.

Final Thoughts

I did a few blog posts in addition to my reviews, and you can find those in my blog archives if you are interested in checking them out.

Overall, this has been another good month of reading. My favorite was probably The Atlas Six, but there were quite a few this month that I really, really loved. What was your favorite book from October? Let me know down in the comments!

Thank you to everyone who has visited the blog and engaged with comments and/or likes! I appreciate all of you and always enjoy reading your input in the comments. I hope everyone is having a great November!