The Book Blogger Hop was originally created by Crazy-For-Books and is currently being hosted by Coffee Addicted Writer. Every Friday, a new question is posted for book bloggers to answer in the coming week. The purpose of the hop is connection and community. You can discover new blogs to follow, new books to read, and you may end up with some new followers, as well!
This Week’s Prompt
How do you decide which books to highlight on your blog?
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 sharing on social media, don’t forget to use #FirstLinesFridays!
Hello, reader!
It’s another First Lines Friday and, this time, I’ve picked a book club book that I’m pretty excited about reading! It’s a mystery that has a full cast audiobook and, full disclouser, I’ve already started reading this.
The first line certainly grabbed my attention, so let’s see if it can do the same for you!
The Line(s):
“07:01. Someone will die here this morning at this suburban train station.”
It’s time for another WWW Wednesday! This is a bookish meme hosted by Taking on a World of Words where bloggers answer the 3 Ws:
What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?
If you’d like to learn more about any of these books, click on the cover to be taken to the Goodreads page.
Current Reads
The Gate of the Feral Gods by Matt Dinniman: I’m pushing myself back into my physical reads, so I finally picked this one back up! There is so much going on yet I don’t find myself confused. I find myself enthralled! This floor is intense and the stakes feel higher for some reason and I’m loving it. I do love a quickly patched together Carl Plan™️ and we’re getting plenty of them in this book 😂.
The Secret World of Briar Rose by Cindy Pham: I picked up my e-ARC of this and it’s going… fine? I’m not vibing with the plot just yet, but I think our two main characters have a lot of potential. I am only 5% in, so I can’t truly judge yet. I’m hoping as I get further in and the plot really kicks in, I’ll start loving it more!
Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt: I’ve had so many people in my life tell me I needed to read this book. My Libby hold came in, so I decided, why not? I’m really enjoying the audiobook (the narrators are doing a great job!) but there’s something about this book that is getting on my last nerve. And that something is Cameron 😒 Am I meant to like this giant man-baby?? Cause right now I kind of want to toss him into a dumpster. I’m hoping we’re working towards character growth but we’re 65% in and I’m losing hope.
Goodreads Monday/TBR Monday is a bookish meme hosted by Emily @ Budget Tales Book Bloginvites you to post about what books are on your Goodreads “to read” lists or TBR lists, the progress you have made on your current books and reading challenges, and any other bookish news!
Hello, reader!
It’s the start of the week again and it’s time for Goodreads Monday! Not gonna lie, I’m feeling a little meh today because I’m having a procedure done tomorrow that required me to have a liquid diet all day today 🫠 So I’m just gonna jump right into it!
Random Goodreads Pick
Book: American Psycho
Author: Bret Easton Ellis
Publisher: Vintage Contemporaries
Publication Date: March 6th, 1991
Pages: 399
Genre: Thriller/Horror
Synopsis: Patrick Bateman is twenty-six and works on Wall Street. He is handsome, sophisticated, charming and intelligent. He is also a psychopath. Taking us to head-on collision with America’s greatest dream—and its worst nightmare—American Psycho is a bleak, bitter, black comedy about a world we all recognize but do not wish to confront.
The Sunday Post is a blog news meme created by @CaffeinatedReviewer! It gives you a chance to post a recap of your last week, whether that pertains to books or not. You can talk about however much (or however little) you would like.
Hello, reader!
The end of the weekend is here and that means it’s time for The Sunday Post! Time to wrap up my past week and my past blog posts. It wasn’t an eventful week, but it was a good one!
Why don’t we jump right in.
Week in Review
Work was work this past week, haha. I did mix it up a bit by working late shift both Monday and Tuesday. Not gonna lie, I kind of liked it. There’s less people there, I can focus on my own section, and I was busy so the time flew by! I also got to work from home on Friday, which was nice. Sitting in Teams meetings is a lot more enjoyable when you have a cat on your lap 😂
Other than that, I got to have lunch with some of the ladies from my choir. That was absolutely lovely! It was nice to sit and chat while we’re on our summer break from choir. The weather was also perfect to sit out on the host’s porch and watch the birds while we chatted. All in all, it was a lovely lunch.
This weekend was mostly dedicated to chores. We mowed the lawn and did some general cleaning up yesterday. And today we finally got some grocery shopping done! I dislike doing chores, but I do love the feeling I get when their done. I also got to listen to an audiobook while I was mowing and I am loving my current audiobook, so it made the whole thing a lot more bearable, haha.
Now that I’ve talked about what I’m going to be reading in June, I figured I should wrap up my reading in May! It was an interesting reading month in May… mostly because I could not seem to focus on any of my physical reads. My attention span for physical reads has been absolutely shot, lately. I’m hoping that goes away soon because I have a lot of physical books to read 😂
But back to May’s reads! Let’s jump right in.
May Reading Stats
In May 2026, I read 7 books for 2,383 pages. One book less than April, but right around my average per month! I’m not mad about it, especially since Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream stole quite a bit of my reading time last month, haha. The game is freakin’ addicting! Still, I’m happy I got a good amount of reading in despite being glued to my Switch.
Though fantasy is still up there, thriller/mystery claimed the top spot in May. They weren’t my favorite reads of the month, but they were the majority of my reading! Maybe I just read too many thrillers back-to-back and that’s why I wasn’t loving them as much? Who knows, but I know I definitely need a tiny break after I finish the current thriller I’m reading! My genre spread isn’t as varied this month, so maybe I’ll work on that in June.
Annnnd audiobooks have edged ahead of my physical reads! I think this is the first time I listened to more audiobooks than read physical books this year. Like I said, my physical reads were just not holding my attention in May, but audiobooks had their hooks in me! Even the audiobooks that had terrible narration! (Looking at you, Not Quite Dead Yet…) Though I’m loving my audio reads, I would like to bring this pie chart back to more of a 50/50.
The 5 star trend continues! That’s two months in a row where I had a 5 star read! My overall star rating, however, wasn’t as high as last month because my ratings were a little more spread out. Still, an overall rating of 3.79 stars is pretty great! I’ve noticed I tend to give out 4 star ratings quite liberally, but if a book entertains me and leaves me with good vibes, I feel like it deserves a 4! If it was fine, it gets around a 3. You have to really annoy me to get less than a 3 star from me quite honestly. So my ratings tend higher and I’m okay with that!
May has ended and summer is starting to show itself here in New England! June has rushed up on me because I cannot believe May is already over. Now that we’re in the first week of June, though, it’s time to let y’all know what I’m hoping to read this month. It is Pride Month, so I want to focus on LGBTQIA+ reads. Whether or not I will actually read them is truly up to my attention span this month, haha.
With that being said, let me share with you my June TBR!
The Book Club Reads
AFB Book Club
Love & Other Disasters by Anita Kelly
I remember when this book came out and I was vaguely intrigued by it. I do love the idea of sparks flying on a cooking show! The fact that one of the main characters is trans definitely piqued my interest, as well. I’m feeling in the mood for romance, as well, so I’m excited to get into this!
Literally Dead Book Club
Five by Ilona Bannister
I had not heard of this book before it was picked as the June read for this club. Reading the synopsis, though, I find myself eager to pick this up! It sounds like it’s going to have an interesting writing style, breaking the fourth wall to try and get us, the readers, to decide which of our five main characters might be dead soon. I wanna see how the author pulls this off.
Weirdo Book Club
The Maiden and Her Monster by Maddie Martinez
Again, I hadn’t heard of this book before it became a book club pick, but it certainly sounds intriguing! A dark, creepy woods? A young woman trying to save her mother? And maybe falling in love with the “monster” of the woods??? Sign me up!
Goodreads Monday/TBR Monday is a bookish meme hosted by Emily @ Budget Tales Book Bloginvites you to post about what books are on your Goodreads “to read” lists or TBR lists, the progress you have made on your current books and reading challenges, and any other bookish news!
Hello, reader!
Happy Pride Month, y’all! And happy Goodreads Monday! My mind is a little boggled that it is already June. May was like a blink-and-you-miss-it kind of month… I am excited to celebrate Pride Month, though, so I thought I’d be a little more picky with this week’s Goodreads pick to kick it off right!
Let’s get to the book I choose.
Random Goodreads Pick
Book: When the Tides Held the Moon
Author: Venessa Vida Kelley
Publisher: Erewhon Books
Publication Date: April 29th, 2025
Pages: 464
Genre: Fantasy/Romance/Historical Fiction
Synopsis: In Coney Island, true love rises to the surface. With lush illustrations and buoyant prose, Venessa Vida Kelley forges an unforgettable New York fairytale.
Benigno “Benny” Caldera knows an orphaned Boricua blacksmith in 1910s New York City can’t call himself an artist. But the ironwork tank he creates for famed Coney Island playground, Luna Park, astounds the eccentric sideshow proprietor who commissioned it. He invites Benny to join the show’s eclectic cast and share in their shocking secret: the tank will cage their newest exhibit, a live merman stolen from the salty banks of the East River.
More than a mythic marvel, Benny soon comes to know the merman Río as a kindred spirit, wise and more compassionate than any human he’s ever met. Despite their different worlds, what begins as a friendship of necessity deepens to love, leading Benny’s heart into uncharted waters where he can no longer ignore the agonizing truth of Río’s captivity—and his own.
Releasing Río could mean losing his found family, his new home, and his soulmate forever. Yet Benny’s courageous choice may just reveal a love strong enough to free them both.
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 sharing on social media, don’t forget to use #FirstLinesFridays!
Hello, reader!
Happy First Lines Friday! The book I’ve decided to feature today is one I just picked up at the library. It’s one I’ve been eager to read for ages and I’m glad I had the chance to snag a copy. It’s a non-fiction about a topic I’ve always found fascinating, though tragic.
The first line will most definitely give it away, but it certainly has me ready to dive in!
The Line(s):
“The scientist had forgotten all about the radium.”
May is almost over and I haven’t given y’all an update on my Library Love project yet! It’s been a busy month and I was only able to make it to the library this week. It was a lovely visit, though, because I didn’t have anywhere else to be so I could just linger. I love a good library linger.
Now, let me share with you what I picked up and how my library reading went last month!
Last Month’s Stack
In April, I checked out five physical books and two audiobooks.
My physical picks were:
One Day Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This by Omar El Akkad
The Red Winter by Cameron Sullivan
Strange Buildings by Uketsu
Through Gates of Garnet and Gold by Seanan McGuire
When Trees Testify by Beronda L. Montgomery
My audiobook picks were:
The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna
The Serviceberry by Robin Wall Kimmerer
Sooooo, I didn’t do as well with reading all my library reads in April 😅 I read 2 of the physical books and both of the audiobooks. My physical reads have been suffering the more the year goes on, y’all, but I’m trying to get back into the groove! At least I enjoyed all the library books I did manage to actually read in April.
Kerri McBookNerd 