Monthly Wrap Up

Monthly Wrap Up – January 2021

By on • ( 19 Comments )

The first month of 2021 is done, and it flew by. I read a lot of books this month, and celebrated my birthday! 

This year I want to focus on my goals for the year. So here we go:

  • I wanted to grow my blog, and I got to 265 followers this month.
  • I made the decision to focus on drinking more water. While I didn’t hit my water goal every day, I did drink more water throughout the month.
  • I wanted to try and schedule my blog posts in advance, but I didn’t do that in January.
  • I read a LOT of ARCs, and got my NetGalley ratio up to 80%. Of course, it only stayed at 80% for a couple of days before I got approved for another ARC and it dropped under, but I’ve slowed down on requesting and plan to focus on working through my ARCs.
  • I made some progress on diversifying my reading. Only one-third of my books read were YA, and one-third was fantasy. 11 of my books had an LGBTQ+ character (room for improvement), more than half had a BIPOC character, and 25% were written by BIPOC authors (room for improvement).

Here’s my breakdown of monthly/cumulative totals for January:

January Totals

  • Books read: 30!!
  • Books DNF’d: 1
  • Pages read: 7358
  • Hours listened: 97:33:55
  • Average pages: 367.9
  • Average hours listened: 9:45:24

Genres Read in January:

  • Fantasy: 10
  • General Fiction: 3
  • Historical Fiction: 5
  • Mystery/Suspense: 5
  • Romance/Erotica: 4
  • Science Fiction: 1
  • Travel/Food: 2

Backlist vs. New Releases

  • Backlist books: 19
  • 2021 releases: 11

Fiction Vs. Non-Fiction

  • Fiction: 28
  • Nonfiction: 2

Format Read:

  • Print: 9
  • Digital: 11
  • Audio: 10

Age Range

  • Adult: 19
  • YA: 10
  • Middle Grade: 1

My favorite books of the month were A Heart So Fierce and Broken, Wings of Ebony, and Beach Read.

Here’s what I read in January:

How was your January?

Categories: Monthly Wrap Up

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19 replies »

  2. Whoa! Whoa on many fronts! First of all, 30 books is amazing 😍 And I’m also looking at your DNF and 2-star ratings and my jaw dropped but also my curiosity is piqued! Hahaha These are both books that I still need to read and well, obviously the hype is super duper real. 😂 At least the majority of your reads were 5 stars though! That’s awesome. I hope you have a great February, Leah!

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    • Hahahahaha I actually didn’t like The Night Circus either, although I pushed through on that one. I think her style just isn’t for me, which is why I DNFd The Starless Sea. And I just didn’t see the hype with Addie LaRue! Yeah, I did a ton of reading in January 😂 but most of it was good. Here’s to a great February! 💕

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    • Thanks! Yeah, her writing just isn’t a good fit for me. I didn’t love The Night Circus, and someone told me The Starless Sea was a totally different experience, so I figured I’d try it, but I just didn’t enjoy it. I hope you like it better when you try it this time around!

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      • I didn’t get on with the night circus at first either but I re-read it last year and loved it so much – not sure why my opinion had changed! Then tried to get into The Starless Sea a few months afterwards and couldn’t get into it. I agree her writing can be tricky and definitely not for everyone, I will really have to be in the mood for The Starless Sea when I give it another go

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  6. I’m glad you had several 5-star reads on January! My own Jan. started off well, and then last 2 weeks met with some really disappointing books. I hope Feb. turns out better but I think I’ll take it slower.
    I saw Bridgerton on your list. Inspired by the Netflix show? I heard Season 2 will come soon in March, so look forward to that!

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  8. I’m so happy to see you enjoyed Beach Read! It was my top read for last year. ❤ I'm so jealous of your backlist #. 19 books is awesome! I'm trying to get caught up on my ARCs so I can get to my backlist. 😉 Happy reading in February!

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