December 2022 Wrap-Up 🧣

Happy Saturday, bibliophiles, and happy New Year’s Eve!

Whew. This strange, chaotic year is coming to a close, but what matters most is that despite everything, we’re still here. Whoever you are, I’m proud of you for making it through another year. You did it!

GENERAL THOUGHTS:

December was certainly a little stressful at the beginning, what with my first finals season in college. Most of my classes were fine, seeing as all of my English *finals* were mostly essays and portfolios, but stats and bio anth were a little tougher. But in the end, I got out with good grades, and I won’t have to take a math class again in my college career. You have no idea how happy I am about that.

The great thing about being in college (in my case, at least) is that we have a really long winter break! After the chaos of finals, I’ve had a lot of time to settle down, relax, and spend the holidays with family. I’ve been in a major reading slump since finals, but the combination of some finds from my dad’s comic shelf, some Christmas gifts, and the haul from my Barnes & Noble gift card, I’m back into my regular reading rhythm! I’m so excited to read the rest of my haul!!

Other than that, I’ve been drawing more, putting together a puzzle (of David Bowie, who else would it be), watching Andor (SO GOOD), Glass Onion (I cannot stress enough how wonderful this movie is), and Decision to Leave (I still don’t completely know how I feel about this one), seeing The Smile live (CRYING CRYING CRYING), and enjoying spending time at home with my family over the break.

And yes, I know it’s New Year’s Eve, but there is a MUCH more important holiday going on today, and that’s Ringo’s first birthday!! My boy turns 1 today!! Everybody say happy birthday to Ringo

Also, I figured it might be fun to share some highlights from my apple music wrapped, sorry, replay—I’ve always wished that apple music had a wrapped equivalent, so, uh, Christmas miracle, I guess?

READING AND BLOGGING:

I read 15 books this month! It was my worst reading month as far as reading goes, but it was also finals week, so it’s all fine. I completed my reading challenge of 200 books and read 224 books in all this year!

2 – 2.75 stars:

• We Light Up the Sky – Lilliam Rivera (⭐️⭐️)
• A House Between Earth and the Moon – Rebecca Scherm (⭐️⭐️)
• Deep in Providence – Riss M. Neilson (⭐️⭐️)
• Aces Wild: A Heist – Amanda DeWitt (⭐️⭐️.5)

3 – 3.75 stars:

• Women Don’t Owe You Pretty – Florence Given (⭐️⭐️⭐️)
• Artificial Condition (The Murderbot Diaries, #2) – Martha Wells (⭐️⭐️⭐️.5)
• A Venom Dark and Sweet (The Book of Tea, #2) – Judy I. Lin (⭐️⭐️⭐️.5)
• The Genesis of Misery – Neon Yang (⭐️⭐️⭐️.5)
• Last Night at the Telegraph Club – Malinda Lo (⭐️⭐️⭐️.5)
• Hellboy: On Earth as it is in Hell – Brian Hodge (⭐️⭐️⭐️.75)

4 – 4.75 stars:

• Vengeful (Villains, #2) – V.E. Schwab (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)
• City of Spells (Into the Crooked Place, #2) – Alexandra Christo (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)
• Gleanings: Stories from the Arc of a Scythe – Neal Shusterman et. al. (anthology) (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)
• DC: The New Frontier, vol. 1 – Darwyn Cooke (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)
• House of Hollow – Krystal Sutherland (⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)

FAVORITE BOOK OF THE MONTH: Gleanings: Stories from the Arc of a Scythe – 4 stars

POSTS I’M PROUD OF:

• I had fun reviewing A Venom Dark and Sweet and Gleanings!
• I had fun doing the Winter is Coming Book Tag and the Random Number Book Tag!
• I compiled all of my 5-star reads of this year!

POSTS FROM OTHER WONDERFUL PEOPLE THAT I ENJOYED:

• Amaya discussed her pet peeves with book covers!
• Ella went through her Spotify wrapped!
• Laura made a great new book tag!
• Jan talks about her worst books of 2022!

SONGS/ALBUMS THAT I ENJOYED:

It’s been a scary and jarring year, but it’s been wonderful too. I graduated high school and started college, and I pushed myself out of my comfort zone more than I have in ages. I made new friends, I went to so many amazing concerts and read so many fantastic books. It’s been weird and uncertain (and I cried a lot), but in the end, what matters is that we got through it. No matter how good or bad of a year you had, I hope 2023 brings hope, love, and good things to each and every one of you. We got this.

Have a wonderful new year. Spread love, be kind to each other.

— madeline

Today’s song:

That’s it for this month in blogging! Have a wonderful rest of your day, take care of yourselves, and have a happy new year!