The Monthly Checkup: March 2016

Well, I’m not giving this to you mid-April, so I already count this March wrap-up a success. March was an incredibly slow month for me. I just wasn’t motivated enough to do anything once I got off work that didn’t involve burrowing beneath my covers and sleeping. Writing blog posts was starting to be a bit of a chore, so I kind of backed off a bit and only posted when the writing bug hit me. Judging from the following list, I didn’t do all that bad just still more behind with reviews than I wanted to be.

In terms of books, I read 5 (maybe 6) books this month which is still great for me considering the fact that I read slow af. Ahem. So, without further adieu, here’s my March in review. (I’m a poet.)

Book Reviews

• Audiobook Review: The Rest of Us Just Live Here by Patrick Ness
• Book Review: Cinder by Marissa Meyer
• Reviews After Dark: An Introduction
• Reviews After Dark: Under His Kilt by Melissa Blue
• Book Review Lite: Fortunately the Milk by Neil Gaiman

Top Ten Tuesday

• The One Where She Bashes Your Faves <– my fave, tbh
• The One Where She Exposes Just a Portion of Her Nearest TBR Pile
• The One Where She Attempts March (Book) Madness… Sorta

Other Bookish Things

• Tag Me Thursday: This or That
• Book Therapy: February 2016 (Part 1)
• Book Therapy: February 2016 (Part 2)
• The Monthly Checkup: February 2016
• Tag Me Thursday: The Playlist Shuffle

We Are the Ants by Shaun Hutchinson
Rating: ½
I. HAVE. MANY. FEELS. God, this book was so great. It was the only thing I could actually get through after the amazingness that was Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda. If all goes well, I hope to have this book review up on Wednesday. So, stay tuned!

Saga 4 &5 by Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples
Rating:
The perfection is strong with this one, guys. Never in my wildest dreams did I think this series would be able to keep me so helplessly involved from start to waiting-impatiently-for-the-next-volume. To be honest, I thought Saga was done, so I blew through volume 5 only to be faced with the fact that volume 6 won’t release until July… J-U-L-Y. I will be rereading each of these to write special reviews for each of them because they are all my precious babies and they deserve the best.

Under His Kilt by Melissa Blue
Rating:
Steam Level:
One of the many many many eBooks I’d thirst-bought during Amazon’s Valentine’s Day Weekend sale… I didn’t like it as much as I wanted to. I did, however, write up a review about it to usher in my new Reviews After Dark book review segment. Feel free to read at your leisure ;)

A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab
Rating: ½
I kind of want to give this book a coveted 5-Creature Rating, man. My mind can’t possibly pick out that many things that I found problematic with it. Ugh. It was just so damn good, and I can’t believe you guys haven’t been trying to shove Schwab in my life since I got here. Review pending (hopefully it’s not just a gush fest).

A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab

Now, usually I don’t do this but, uh, gone ‘head and break them off a little preview of the remix I really need to have a legitimate list this much in the hopes of getting my last-minute Bookcon reading done in a timely manner. May 14th will be here before I know it, apparently. Hopefully, putting this up will hold me somewhat accountable. (Yup, because that worked so well with those reading challenges. How are those going, Morgan?)

• Rat Queens Volume 1
• Lumberjanes Volume 1
• Blue Lily, Lily Blue
• Throne of Glass
• A Gathering of Shadows
• Six of Crows/Shadow & Bone
• Red Rising
• An Ember in the Ashes
• The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

Each month, I like to highlight a few posts from fellow bloggers that either made me think or entertained me like no other. These are the only ones I have links for because I kind of dropped the ball and deleted the folder where I’d been stashing links. Whoops.

As always, I encourage you to check them out!

Do You Ever NOT Recommend Your Favourite Books? from Cait @ Paper Fury

• This is a great discussion posts that takes into consideration some fears we as readers may have when it comes to recommending our absolute favorite books. I know I often fight with myself regarding whether or not to shove a book in my friend’s face or hoarding it to myself because I might get hella offended if he didn’t think it was good. Anywhoozles, a great read worth checking out.

How Good is Your Book Memory? from Alise at Readers in Wonderland

• Think you’re alone in the struggle when it comes to remembering every single detail you’ve read in the past month? Well, you are not alone. Alise shares about her own battles with remembering book characteristics, and I think it’s something I don’t really see many people talking about which makes me feel somehow less-than I forget things ALL. THE. TIME.

Bloggiesta: Stock Photo Organization Challenge! from Chelsea at Books for Thought

• As bloggers, organization is something we have to tackle at one time or another. Well, Chelsea here has a little system to keep all of your lovely stock photos in order. Check it out if you’re looking to do a little spring cleaning in your blog folders some time soon.