The Looooong and the Short of It with a Giveaway: November 2022 Wrap-Up Post and What to Expect in December

Posted November 30, 2022 by Lisa Mandina in End of the month post, giveaway / 8 Comments

November is over today! And while I didn’t have a Thanksgiving banner for my blog, I do have a new Christmas one, and I put that up right after Thanksgiving.

November went by so fast! I mean there was all the countdown to Thanksgiving of course, as well as I was sick for a bit at the beginning. Then I had a week off for Thanksgiving, where I got a ton of reading done, almost a book a day! Then this week was half of November and then we started December.

It was a great month even with being sick. I had a pretty nice Thanksgiving, and we even took a family picture which we haven’t done, and not with all of us in a long time!

I also put together my new office desk, which took a whole day by myself. But one thing I love about it is that it has this little rail/border section that makes it so I can actually take pictures of my new books and then I have my library in the background!

Now let’s talk reading totals. Technically the month isn’t over till tomorrow, but I decided to go ahead and post today. I read 18 books this month, one more than last month! Quite a few holiday books as you can see from the picture below. I had no DNFs even though I had one that I came close to giving up on. I got all my past-due DNFs posted this month too. I had no overdue reviews, but I do have a few from this month that I haven’t posted yet because they weren’t part of blog tours or author team reviews. I think I’m going to start doing my L-L-L Review posts with those every month. Start the post at the beginning of the month or as soon as I finish the last month’s one and add as the month goes by.

  • # of pages read: 5599
  • Amount of time spent listening to audiobooks – I had some issues with audiobooks this month. Between not driving to work every day thanks to being sick and also Thanksgiving break, I got behind, and even had one audiobook I got for a tour that I had trouble with. I think I started a couple too and gave up on them, decided I wanted to read instead of listen. I only count what I finished in a month, even though I may have listened.

November Reviews

Challenge Wrap-Up

Yeah, not a lot of improvements in my goals.

Okay, I did get one more done for this one, Spoiler Alert by Olivia Dade. I’d been reading it for a while, but now I have 5 out of the 12 for my goal. Look for its review in December as part of my L-L-L-Little Review post for the month.

  • Blogging: Still at 79% on Netgalley. But I’m keeping up with the books as I get them requested now for the most part. Also have done a pretty good job at not signing up for more review tours that aren’t my usual authors that I know I have to read or am on their review teams. Hoping next year to get some of my TBR read that way!
  • Reading: As I mentioned last month, I bumped my goal up to 210. I’m currently on track, go between a book or two ahead and right on track depending what I’m reading at the moment.
  • Writing: I’ve only done one night where I did some editing. I did try to find all the different files to get them in one place for my YA book that I want to self publish, but still need to work on getting them all together.

What to Expect in December

We have basically three weeks before winter break, if you add the two days this week and the 19th and 20th. But there will be end of course exams this month closing my library for hours at a time. My stepdad seems to be continuing on the same path of at least staying healthy, possibly improving. Not a lot of news on that front right now. I’m hoping to use my time on break in December to actually get my editing done since I didn’t use my Thanksgiving break for that. But I also have lots of reading to do still as I’m supposed to get all those books read for the Gateway committee.

Here is my proposed TBR for December:

Look how great I did with cutting back on review tours! Only 5 here! The others are ones I want to read or need to read for the Gateway Reader Award library committee I’m on.

  1. A Forest Between Us by Allie Winters – the author reached out to me last month, review should be here on the 5th, almost finished this one in time to add to my number of books read in November, but just didn’t get it done before I put this post up.
  2. He Loves Me, He Loves Me Not by Aimee Brown – for a blog tour review on the 10th
  3. Lore by Alexandra Bracken – reading for both the Gateway nominee list as well as for a blog tour the last couple weeks of December
  4. Drama King by Penny Reid – hoping to read and review for a blog tour on the 20th
  5. Blinded Me With Science by Tara September – listening to this audiobook for a blog tour review, although it’s not great, should post one of the first two weeks of December.
  6. Talk Santa to Me by Linda Urban – finishing up last month for Gateway, should post review as part of my L-L-L Little Review post
  7. The Other Merlin by Robyn Schneider – another book for Gateway, listening to the audio
  8. Dashing Through the No by Tara Sivec – a holiday read which I’m going to try to get some read this month!
  9. Screwing Mr. Scrooge by Nichole Green – bought this for a local author who will be at a convention in Kansas City in February. Another holiday read.
  10. The Holiday Swap by Maggie Knox – So, this is on one of my challenges for this year. I bought it last year as one of my Book of the Month choices. Another holiday read.
  11. The Christmas Blanket by Kandi Steiner – I bought this and it looks like a smaller one, so I might try to add it to my holiday reads too!
  12. The Love Match by Priyanka Taslim – An ARC I got from the publisher for a review in January
  13. Highly Suspicious and Unfairly Cute by Talia Hibbert – I got this e-galley on Netgalley I think. Should be reading and reviewing first week of January
  14. As I always say every month, any other audiobooks I listen to or Gateway books I can get added in!

Final Thoughts

So, how was your November? Did you get all the reading you wanted done? If you celebrate Thanksgiving, were you able to do that this year? What are you looking forward to in December? Do you celebrate Christmas or any other holidays? Do you like to decorate?

Giveaway

Below are ARCs I’ve finished and also a couple of finished copies, the winner will get to pick out 3 books from the list. There may even be a few more choices by the end of the month! I will make the giveaway international in that you can pick a book for under $10 if The Book Depository ships to you. Just fill out the Rafflecopter below the picture. I will continue to do a second winner if I continue to get over 100 entries into the rafflecopter by the end of the month, I’ve had over 100 in June, August, September, October, and November, so I did pick two winners from those Wrap-Up giveaways.

a Rafflecopter giveaway
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8 responses to “The Looooong and the Short of It with a Giveaway: November 2022 Wrap-Up Post and What to Expect in December

    • Lisa Mandina

      Thanks! The new banners are so much fun! The book is cute like the title. I’m now for sure looking forward to meeting the author in February!

    • Lisa Mandina

      I know! December got here so fast it seems! I’ve been starting my end of the month posts about a week early, like I started doing my week end posts at the beginning of every week and adding to them. I got the idea from you with all your blogging ahead! 🙂

    • Lisa Mandina

      Yeah, I had two desks kind of pushed together to make an L, but then it wasn’t open between both sides which was a pain. And one of them was black and the other was white, so they didn’t match either. Thanks for stopping by!

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