The Looooong and the Short of It with a Giveaway: November 2023 Wrap-Up Post and What to Expect in December

Posted December 2, 2023 by Lisa Mandina in End of the month post, giveaway / 10 Comments

If I thought October flew by, then wow did November fly by even faster! Between worrying about my stepdad’s health with his chemo, Thanksgiving, lots of things going on at school, etc., I can’t believe we’re now in December and 2023 is almost over! My reading was on the high average – 17, even with a bunch of DNFs, I think because of the lovely whole week I had off for Thanksgiving where I did a lot of reading!

  • # of pages read: 3417 – even though my number of books read might be more, I read several novellas and a couple picture books so there were less pages.
  • Amount of time spent listening to audiobooks – Since I only count what I finished, my time spent was 29 hours and 40 minutes for 3 audiobooks, I did end up with another DNF for the Gateway books.

Here are my stats from StoryGraph:

November Reviews

Of the 18 specific titles listed last month, I got 11 read and most reviewed, 4 DNFs, and two I switched out for other titles for the Ho-Ho-Ho Readathon. I did get two more Gateways finished as audiobooks as well, and a third that was a DNF audiobook.

Challenge Wrap-Up

2023 HoHoHo Readathon

So this wrapped up at the beginning of the week, and I definitely made my goal of 3 books, although one of them changed. I ended up reading 4 for the challenge:

  1. Naughty-ish by L.B. Dunbar
  2. Christmas Shopping for a Billionaire by Julia Kent
  3. Lovelight Farms by B.K. Borison
  4. Along Came Holly by Codi Hall

One new book read for this. Although as I’d already met and exceeded my goal, not a big deal I guess. It was an e-book for the Ho-Ho-Ho Readathon.

  1. The Hunger Between Us by Marina Scott
  2. Twisted Love by Ana Huang
  3. Lord of the Fly Fest by Goldy Moldavy
  4. Always Jane by Jenn Bennett
  5. My Second Impression Of You by Michelle I. Mason
  6. Gold Mountain by Betty G. Yee
  7. Spicy Pickle by J.J. Knight
  8. My Mechanical Romance by Alexene Farol Follmuth
  9. Forging Silver Into Stars by Brigid Kemmerer
  10. Rima’s Rebellion by Margarita Engle
  11. The Lost Dreamer by Lizz Huerta
  12. One for All by Lillie Lainoff
  13. The Dachshund Wears Prada by Stefanie London
  14. Beyond the Wand by Tom Felton
  15. I Must Betray You by Ruta Sepetys
  16. The Warning by Kristy Acevedo
  17. Shame on Me by Tara Sivec
  18. Dragonfly in Amber by Diana Gabaldon
  19. Howl by Shaun David Hutchinson
  20. Swing and a Mishap by Tara Sivec
  21. Shame On Him by Tara Sivec
  22. Twice Shy by Sarah Hogle
  23. Christmas Shopping for a Billionaire by Julia Kent

I kicked it up and got 3 more discussion posts done in November! So to meet my goal of 6 for the year, that means I only need one more in December.

  1. Don’t You Know That You’re Toxic or Why Don’t People Get the Point of This Book?
  2. Got to Get You Into My Life or How Am I Ever Going to Read All Those Books I Bought as soon as they were Published??
  3. I’ve Had the Time of My Life or How Do You Feel About Book Conventions?
  4. Dancing With Myself or How Many Bookish Friends Do You Have In Real Life or Outside of the Book Blogging World?
  5. Can’t Buy Me Love or Have You Ever Tried to Keep Your Book Buying on a Budget?
  • Blogging:
    • 1. Keep my Netgalley percentage up to 80%. Dropped to just 80% at the end of the month, probably for a few of the DNFs I put in that I wasn’t reviewing.
    • 2. Discussion Challenge: See update above, I only need one more!
  • Reading:
    • 1. As always is my Goodreads goal of 200 books. I keep hovering between 4 and 5 books behind even after adding in some novellas and shorter audiobooks and picture books! Gah!
    • 2. My TBR Challenge above.
  • Writing – As I’m still done with writing, I’m continuing to help my author friend get ready to hopefully get a bunch of new readers at Flirty in KC in February.
  • Book Buying Ban – Pretty sure I’m not doing this anymore, lol. I was bad and got not only the book of the month, but two and an extra one that I’d already read because I had the author’s other books from them, so now they match? I even wrote a discussion post about this one above.

What to Expect in December

A long almost 3 weeks till our break from school for about two weeks. Plus I’m watching my friend’s dog till the 14th, so not sure how much reading I’ll get done like I need to in order to catch up to my goal. I’ll also participate in the Top 10 days the last couple weeks.

Here is my proposed TBR for December:
  1. Sense and Irritability by Emma Lee Jayne – hoping to get the e-galley from the author and should be posting a review on the 4th
  2. My Darling Bride by Ilsa Madden-Mills – I’m on the author’s review team, so should be reading and post a review on the 5th
  3. Where It Begins by Helena Hunting – another book for an author’s review team, I read it last month actually, but the review will be on the 6th
  4. Whoa by Cambria Hebert – I think I’m reading and reviewing this for a blog tour on the 8th
  5. Otherworldly by F. T. Lukens – an ARC from the publisher that they wanted me to read early, so even though it doesn’t come out till next year, I’ll be posting my review on the 11th
  6. On the Plus Side by Jenny L. Howe – the publisher sent me the Netgalley e-galley link for this one, so I plan to read and post a review probably on the 26th
  7. If the Shoe Fits by Julie Murphy – I started this audiobook in November, and will probably finish it this month, I stopped to listen to a Christmas one for Ho-Ho-Ho Readathon.
  8. Oops, I’ve Fallen by Max Monroe – one I started for the TBR challenge back in September, hope to finish before the end of the year
  9. Voyager by Diana Gabaldon – I started this one earlier this year and it is really long, but would love to get it finished before the next part of this season of Outlander starts up in 2024.
  10. Any other Gateway books I need to get listened to, like I know that I have The Getaway by Lamar Giles on hold from the library audiobooks, so unless it turns into a DNF I’ll listen to it this month.
  11. The Lost Ones by Lauren DeStefano – an ARC I got at AASL that I hope to read and post the review at the beginning of January
  12. Any other Gateway possibilities I get a chance to read
  13. And with my holiday break any others I get to, several holiday ones I’ve got sitting on a pile, hopefully enough to reach my goal of 200 books!

Final Thoughts

So how was your November? Like I mentioned above, I had family issues but also get togethers. We got winter weather and I did get quite a bit of reading done! Unfortunately my Chiefs did not do as great as we needed them to all month! But I did continue to enjoy the Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift romance saga. And I did get tickets to go see NKOTB and a VIP pass to meet them next June.

How close to being finished with your reading/blogging/personal goals for 2023? What are you looking forward to in December? I’m looking forward to winter break, more time off from school, lol.

Giveaway

Below are ARCs I’ve finished and also a couple of finished copies, the winner will get to pick out 2 books from the list, and I add any others I finish between the time I post this and the end of the month. Now that The Book Depository is closing, the only way I can really do international is if I can send you a $5 Amazon gift card somehow, so we’ll see how that works! Just fill out the Rafflecopter below the picture. My October Wrap-Up post got over 500 entries, so I will pick 5 winners!

a Rafflecopter giveaway
Please follow and like us:
0
fb-share-icon0
Tweet 0
Pin Share20

Tags:

10 responses to “The Looooong and the Short of It with a Giveaway: November 2023 Wrap-Up Post and What to Expect in December”

    • Lisa Mandina

      Yeah, I just have too many books and too little time to spend on ones I know I won’t enjoy. That’s my motto I guess, lol.

      Reply
    • Lisa Mandina

      I’m not close, I’m 4 books behind schedule according to Goodreads. I have to get 20 more done to make my goal. I am usually having a good month if I get 17 read! But hopefully with lots of time off for Christmas break and once my extra house guest goes home, that should help. I’ll maybe find some novellas to fit in, lol.

      Reply

Leave a Reply

(Enter your URL then click here to include a link to one of your blog posts.)

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.