Category: lets talk bookish

Let’s Talk Bookish: Novels in Verse
lets talk bookish

Let’s Talk Bookish: Novels in Verse

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Let’s Talk Bookish is a weekly bookish meme created by Rukky @Eternity Books and co-hosted by Aria @Book Nook Bits and Dini @dinipandareads! This meme has a discussion format, where participants get to talk about certain topics, share opinions, and spread the blogging love by visiting other posts. You can learn more about this meme here!

LTB Topic of the Week:
Novels in Verse

Prompts:  Have you read any novels in verse? Do you think novels in verse can be more emotionally powerful compared to regular prose, or do you think novels in verse are more difficult to connect with? What kind of stories do you think work best in verse (i.e. coming-of-age, grief, romance, historical fiction, etc.)? What are your favorite novels in verse?

Have you read any novels in verse? Do you think novels in verse can be more emotionally powerful compared to regular prose, or do you think novels in verse are more difficult to connect with?

I have read a few novels in verse and I thoroughly enjoyed them! Though I gravitate more towards prose than poetry, there’s an undeniably powerful effect a novel in verse can produce. There’s something about poetry that can feel so much more visceral than regular prose. I think the emotional impact can especially be ramped up if you listen to a novel in verse via audiobook! I’ve always connected to poetry more when it is spoken as opposed to reading it. It can be even more impactful if it’s read by the author!

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Let’s Talk Bookish: Immersive Reading
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Let’s Talk Bookish: Immersive Reading

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Let’s Talk Bookish is a weekly bookish meme created by Rukky @Eternity Books and co-hosted by Aria @Book Nook Bits and Dini @dinipandareads! This meme has a discussion format, where participants get to talk about certain topics, share opinions, and spread the blogging love by visiting other posts. You can learn more about this meme here!

LTB Topic of the Week:
Immersive Reading

Prompts:  Immersive reading is when you simultaneously listen to an audiobook while reading the physical or digital book. Do you do any immersive reading? Do you prefer it or is it not for you? Do you think it’s a good way to get everything from a book? Is there a genre that is better to do this with? What are your recommendations for immersive reading?

Do you do any immersive reading? Do you prefer it or is it not for you?

I have heard about immersive reading, but I have yet to try it out myself! Part of the reason is, when I’m listening to an audiobook, I’m typically doing something that wouldn’t allow me to pick up a physical or digital copy. Like driving to work or cleaning the house, ya know? But the more I hear about it, the more I think that it would be so much fun to try! Maybe I would come to prefer it, who knows.

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Let’s Talk Bookish: Book Blogging Slumps
lets talk bookish

Let’s Talk Bookish: Book Blogging Slumps

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Let’s Talk Bookish is a weekly bookish meme created by Rukky @Eternity Books and co-hosted by Aria @Book Nook Bits and Dini @dinipandareads! This meme has a discussion format, where participants get to talk about certain topics, share opinions, and spread the blogging love by visiting other posts. You can learn more about this meme here!

LTB Topic of the Week:
Book Blogging Slumps

Prompts: People frequently talk about reading slumps, but what about blogging slumps? What gives you motivation for blogging? What makes you lose motivation? Have you ever gone through one before? How did you break out of it? What advice would you give to a book blogger who’s in one?

What gives you motivation for blogging? What makes you lose motivation?

Was this prompt written just for me??? I’m coming off of a blogging slump that has lasted at least a year and a half😅 And I can’t quite pinpoint what exactly sent me into that particular spiral. Perhaps going through what does and does not motivate me will help me figure out what happened, haha.

Typically, what most motivates me to blog is being in a good headspace mentally. If I’m stressed out, feeling some heavy emotions, or overwhelmed, the last thing I want to do when I get home is sit down at my computer and write a blog post. Even if I’m excited about whatever post I had planned to write! If my cup is empty, I just want to switch off and I can’t blog when I’m shut down. I’ve noticed that if I’m having a particularly good bout of reading, I feel a lot more motivated to talk about books, which makes me a lot more motivated to blog, as well. I want to talk about books more when my reading is going well because I suppose I just want to spread that good feeling! Even if I only reach a small corner of the bookish world. I also feel more motivated to blog when I’m in a creative mood. I’ve been feeling a need for a creative outlet growing over the past few months and one of the first things I decided to do was dedicated more time to my poor, neglected blog.

Now, there is one main feeling that makes me lose motivation to blog: guilt. When I first decided to do a book blog, I was eager to keep to a strict schedule of posts. And, as soon as I missed a day, the guilt started to settle in. Then I would feel less and less motivated to go back to my blog because I felt so guilty for messing my own, arbitrary, does-not-matter-AT-ALL schedule. Yes, I fully recognize that I kinda threw myself into that downward spiral… but tell my brain that! Other than that, if I’m just feeling frazzled, as I mentioned above, my motivation to blog evaporates.

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Let’s Talk Bookish: Top Reads of 2025
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Let’s Talk Bookish: Top Reads of 2025

kerrimcbooknerd8 Comments

Let’s Talk Bookish is a weekly bookish meme created by Rukky @Eternity Books and co-hosted by Aria @Book Nook Bits and Dini @dinipandareads! This meme has a discussion format, where participants get to talk about certain topics, share opinions, and spread the blogging love by visiting other posts. You can learn more about this meme here!

LTB Topic of the Week
Top 2025 Reads in Five Words/Sentences

Prompts: What were your top 5 (or top 10) reads in 2025? If you had five words or sentences (your choice!) to describe each book and convince other readers to pick it up, how would you describe your 2025 favorites?

What were your top 5 (or top 10) reads in 2025? If you had five words or sentences (your choice!) to describe each book and convince other readers to pick it up, how would you describe your 2025 favorites?

Though 2025 feels like a jumbled mess in my mind, according to Goodreads, I had an incredible reading year. My average rating for 2025 was 3.8 stars! I do remembering enjoying pretty much everything I picked up, though, looking at my reading log, I still didn’t dole out a ton of 5 stars. I’ve been getting a lot more stingy with those lately. That being said, I did have more than 5, but have picked the five that have stuck with me the most to share here.

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Let’s Talk Bookish: Blogs and Book Reviews
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Let’s Talk Bookish: Blogs and Book Reviews

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Let’s Talk Bookish is a weekly bookish meme created by Rukky @Eternity Books and co-hosted by Aria @Book Nook Bits and Dini @dinipandareads! This meme has a discussion format, where participants get to talk about certain topics, share opinions, and spread the blogging love by visiting other posts. You can learn more about this meme here!

LTB Topic of the Week
Writing and Posting Book Reviews

Prompts: Writing book reviews is a huge part of running a book blog. Do book reviews make up a big part of your blog content? Do you prefer to write long or short reviews? How does reviewing advance copies (ARCs) and working directly with authors and publishers change your approach to writing the reviews? Do you post on platforms other than your blog (i.e. Goodreads, The Storygraph, social media) and do those reviews differ from what you share on your blog?

Writing book reviews is a huge part of running a book blog. Do book reviews make up a big part of your blog content?

I would say that book reviews make up a fair chunk of my content. I think the majority of my content leans more to bookish memes, but reviews are probably my second most common blog post. A large chunk of that is because I participate as a panelist for the Book Bloggers’ Novel of the Year Award run by The Write Reads and that involves reading/reviewing quite a few indie books! It’s one of my favorite consequences of starting this blog because I always find some new faves whenever I participate.

The other chunk of my reviews would be Netgalley reviews, especially since I’m trying to catch up on my backlog 😅 Every once in awhile, when I want to gush about a book I love, I’ll write up a rambly review (see my most recent review for Painted Devils, haha), but, for the most part, my reviews are either for a blog tour/BBNYA or for Netgalley.

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Let’s Talk Bookish: Women in STEM
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Let’s Talk Bookish: Women in STEM

kerrimcbooknerd5 Comments

Let’s Talk Bookish is a weekly bookish meme created by Rukky @Eternity Books and co-hosted by Aria @Book Nook Bits and Dini @dinipandareads! This meme has a discussion format, where participants get to talk about certain topics, share opinions, and spread the blogging love by visiting other posts. You can learn more about this meme here!

LTB Topic of the Week
Women in STEM in Books

Prompts: Over the years, there have been an increasing number of books about women in STEM. What do you think of this trend? Do you like it or is it/can it be poorly done? In honour of International Women’s Day tomorrow (March 8), what are your favourite books ft. women in STEM and what books are still on your TBR?

Over the years, there have been an increasing number of books about women in STEM. What do you think of this trend? Do you like it or is it/can it be poorly done?

Let me tell you, when I saw the topic for this week’s Let’s Talk Bookish, I smiled from ear to ear. As a woman in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics), I think you can probably guess how I feel about the rise of femme or femme presenting characters in books being in the STEM field. I love it! I know we’ve all heard this phrase before but, representation matters, and the fact that girls and young women can now freely get their hands on books featuring women in typically male-dominated fields is the kind of representation I can absolutely get behind. Books like that weren’t around when I was a kid. I still aspired to do something science-based, but I was never exposed to women in fields I was thinking of going into. The lack of representation wasn’t exactly a deterrent, but it wasn’t encouraging, either. I’m so happy we’re getting more women in STEM books and I hope this trend continues!

Now whether or not it can be poorly done… I think that’s a matter of personal taste. I’m sure there are books out there that have poor representation because people do love to jump on a trend without doing proper research, but I don’t think that’s overall the case. I also think it’s easier this days to seek out the gems while avoiding the trash, haha. So even though some of the books featuring women in STEM might be not-so-great, I don’t think that takes away from the impact of the trend overall.

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Let’s Talk Bookish: Reading Goals
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Let’s Talk Bookish: Reading Goals

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Let’s Talk Bookish is a weekly bookish meme created by Rukky @Eternity Books and co-hosted by Aria @Book Nook Bits and Dini @dinipandareads! This meme has a discussion format, where participants get to talk about certain topics, share opinions, and spread the blogging love by visiting other posts. You can learn more about this meme here!

LTB Topic of the Week
How Many Books Do You Read in a Year?

Prompts: How many books do you typically read in a year? Do you always track your reading? Does keeping track of the books you read motivate you or stress you out? How do you keep track of the books you read? Do you have a 2025 reading goal?

How many books do you typically read in a year?

Looking back at past Goodreads Reading Challenges, my reading per year is really inconsistent, haha. There are some years where I read over 100 books (my personal best was 134!) and some years where I barely made it to 20 books. There’s one particular year where I only read 2 books! I don’t know what was going on in my life in 2018, but I was not in a bookish mood.

That being said, I usually stick around the 50-60 books per year range, which is comfortable for me. I’m not a fast reader and, until very recently, I wasn’t a big audiobook listener, either. Audiobooks have helped me up my reading numbers significantly and I’ve found I truly enjoy them! It’s fun having a book read to me and the right narrator can even tack on an extra star if their performance is especially great.

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Let’s Talk Bookish: Reading Challenges
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Let’s Talk Bookish: Reading Challenges

kerrimcbooknerd6 Comments

Let’s Talk Bookish is a weekly bookish meme created by Rukky @Eternity Books and co-hosted by Aria @Book Nook Bits and Dini @dinipandareads! This meme has a discussion format, where participants get to talk about certain topics, share opinions, and spread the blogging love by visiting other posts. You can learn more about this meme here!

LTB Topic of the Week
Reading Challenges: Do We Love Them or Hate Them

Prompts: What do you think of reading challenges—do they motivate you or do they feel restrictive and end up making reading feel like a chore? Are there any challenges you participate in yearly? What reading challenges are you joining in 2025?

Hello, reader!

It’s a new year and, today, a new bookish meme on the blog! I’ve seen so many Let’s Talk Bookish posts on various blogs and always enjoy reading the discussions, yet I’ve never jumped in on the fun. Why? …Honestly, I have no idea 😂 But now, I want in on the action! Now I’m here to talk all about reading challenges and my feelings about them. Come join me for my first foray into this gabby meme.

What do you think of reading challenges—do they motivate you or do they feel restrictive and end up making reading feel like a chore?

You know, that answer changes as the year goes on, haha. At the beginning of the year, I find reading challenges to be super motivating! They make me excited for the new year because I love going through the prompts of the challenge once I’ve finished a book and seeing where I can squeeze it in. I love watching the prompts slowly get checked off. It gives me a sense of accomplishment.

…For about three months. Then, after I’ve knocked out a lot of the easier prompts and my random reads start to not check off anymore boxes, I realize that I might have to find specific books for said prompts and my reader soul REVOLTS. I’m a mood reader at heart. I always have been and, anytime I try to pretend I’m not, it never ends well. Actually, it usually ends in a reading slump 😅 So when I start having to pick books that I might not be in the mood to read, my urge to finish my reading challenges quickly wanes. Anytime reading starts to feel like a chore, my brain wants out.

That being said, it doesn’t stop me from trying every year, haha!

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