iron widow – Kerri McBookNerd

Hello reader!

Happy New Year to you all 😊 I hope everyone had a safe, fun New Year’s Eve and are having a relaxing start to 2026. As happens every time we move to December to January, I’ve been thinking about what I want out of this next year. I know for a fact that I want to get back into the groove of book blogging! 2025 was a bit of a crazy year here in my household and yours truly felt like she was drowning under the chaos on the best of days. But our life is starting to find a more chill balance and I feel like I can finally take a deep breath and get back into hobbies that I used to enjoy!

That being said, doing the New Year’s Book Tag seemed like the perfect fresh start for my little blog! I found this on Ashley’s (@BooksAre42) blog and it seemed like kismet. I’m not sure who the original creator might be, but if you know, please drop a comment! Now, let’s get to the tag.

How many books are you planning to read in 2026?

In previous years, I would always up my reading challenge by five if I managed to reach my goal. In 2025, my goal was 60 books and I absolutely smashed that goal by reading 98 books! You would think I could be bold and pick a goal closer to the 90 range, but reading is my favorite hobby and I find keeping my reading challenge lower helps keep it that way, haha. So, my goal for 2026 will be 65 books!

Name 5 books that you didn’t get to this past year but want to make a priority in 2026.

Hahaha, I could definitely list more than five 👀 I barely read anything from my 25 in 2025 list, so I’m going to go with five books from there:

Continue reading →

First Lines Fridays is a weekly feature for book lovers hosted by Wandering Words. What if instead of judging a book by its cover, its author or its prestige, we judged it by its opening lines? If you want to make your own post, feel free to use or edit the banner above, and follow the rules below:

Pick a book off your shelf (it could be your current read or on your TBR) and open to the first page
Copy the first few lines, but don’t give anything else about the book away just yet – you need to hook the reader first
Finally… reveal the book!

If you’re using Twitter, don’t forget to use #FirstLinesFridays!

Hello, reader!

Happy day after American Thanksgiving, Black Friday, or just plain Friday to you! I spent yesterday working, napping, and then stuffing myself with my yearly portion of turkey, among other things. It was a pretty awesome Thanksgiving spent with people I love and I know how lucky I am to have that ❤ But the eating is done, I gotta work today (yay, healthcare!), and it’s time for First Lines Friday!

I didn’t have a specific book in mind for today’s post, so I decided to pick at random for the many stacks that surround my computer desk. Let’s see if the first few lines can make me move it up my TBR.

The Line(s):

“The Hunduns were coming. A whole herd of them, rumbling across the wilds, stirring up a dark storm of dust through the night. Their rotund, faceless bodies, made of spirit metal, glinted under the silver half-moon and sky full of glittering stars.”