It's a Books World

Lately I've been having this feeling. A feeling that I don't care about books anymore. I read less, I watch less Booktube and I buy less. I read one book a month or sometimes not even one at all. So it feels natural for me to stop blogging. Here and also on Instagram. 

It's natural when your hobbies are changing. For years I've felt passioned about books and I've been buying and reading and loved finding out about new ones to buy and read. But my passion has changed since I've doing an education where I design/create a lot. During my first year I felt creating tired me a lot so when I had some free time I didn't want to think about my design projects, so I kept reading, but that has changed. Now when I have some free time I like to play with watercolors/copic art and I love to create for fun (if you like to see and follow what I make, come over to Instagram @viennartdesigns). And when I'm not creating I love spending my time watching tv shows. So here's the end of an era. An era where I really had fun, but that fun has shifted. 

The only platform I will still be using is Goodreads. I'll only post updates on what I've bought (that means when I buy a book like once in four months) and my reading process, but that's about it. Here's the link if you'd like to follow me there (if you don't already).

Thank you for following me over the last few years and even if you started following me recently. 

My biggest goal is to have only about five unread books, so I don't feel overwhelmed and can buy and read a book immediately. Since I found out about Booktube I wanted to buy and read all the books (as everyone), but lately I just want to get rid of many I know I don't want to read ever, or anytime soon, or didn't like that much.

At the beginning of the year I also got rid of some books (can't even remember which ones), so now I only have some unread books I'm going to get rid of. There are ten I decided to unhaul, so now I own 37 books unread (which is still a lot, but now I'm excited for all of them). I'm giving them to a local charity shop (the profit goes to a cancer research company). These are the books I'm unhauling:

I'm no longer interested in reading fantasy or long series, so that's why I'm getting rid of A Darker Shade of Magic and A Court of Thornes and Roses and A Court of Mist and Fury. I'm also not interested in crime (The Cuckoo's Calling, even though it's written by J.K. Rowling) and I don't see myself reading The Waves, Cujo, Dracula, Far From The Madding Crowd, The Woman in White anytime soon. Those editions are really pretty though, so it's a pain in the ass that I'm getting rid of those beautiful Penguin English Library and Word Cloud classic. But if I do want to read them I can buy them again (but that won't be for quite a few years). Oliver Twist is one I still want to read, but I just don't like those editions (really small font so unpleasant to read). 

Now I hope I don't "have" to get rid of some more books next year, but I don't think that will happen.

Do you unhaul books or do you keep them al? 

I’ve never been a fan of audiobooks, but recently I’ve been trying it out for two reasons. One, I’ve been traveling a lot (each day) since I’m doing my internship and I’m not that interested in hearing the same music over and over again. The other reason is that I think it’s great background noise while I’m doing graphic design or painting etc. Last month I’ve been trying out some audiobooks to see whether I like this medium or not and I’m curious if you have some recommendations.

For years I’ve never really liked audiobooks. I can’t seem to focus on them, too monotone (I fall asleep very easily, especially if a man is speaking) and I felt like it took to long to finish one. I also heard Audible popping up everywhere and I didn’t like the fact that you have to deal with credits so listen to just one audiobook and all that marketing stuff. This means that in total (up until last month) I’ve only listened to one audiobook and that was Yes, Please by Amy Poehler. Yep, that’s not a lot.

This year I found out about Scribd (not sponsored and I don’t get any commission) and I thought that service would be very interesting: for 8 dollars unlimited access (to audiobooks (also ebooks and magazines, but I prefer only physical books) and after searching I found out that it has very many audiobooks that you can choose from. You can also access it if you live outside of the US, I live in the Netherlands. After being sick of listening to music all the time and not finding that many great podcasts I decided to give it a try. The audiobook that I choose to listen to first was The Subtle Art Of Not Giving A Fuck by Mark Manson as it was mentioned as one of the best-selling non-fiction books of this year (?) and it was only five hours long (it was still too long in my opinion and I liked it but that’s enough said) and I’me now listing to The Year Of Less by Cait Flanders and I really like it so far.

But I still find that I can’t really seem to focus and that it takes too long. My 30 day trial is coming to an end (next week) and I’m not sure whether to keep it or not (you can easily cancel and start it any month. I did find some memoirs/non-fiction that I maybe want to listen to, but haven’t tried any fiction yet. So if you have any recommendations, please let me know! 

Do you like audiobooks? What are your favorite audiobooks and what app do you use?

At the beginning of the year I made a list of bookish goals I wanted to reach by the end of the year. Since I’ve never shared those with you and because I wanted to check up about them to see what I “need” to do to complete more I decided that it was about time to share them with you.

These are the goals I want(ed) to reach by the end of the year.

- Get to around 40 unread books by the end of the year (I now own 53 unread books)

- Read more Brontë (follow Lucythereader challenge)

- Read more classics (1 per month)

- Read at least 5 little black classics + 5 little modern classics

- Reread more books (at least 5)

One of my biggest goals this year is to have lesser unread books. Currently I have 45, so I’ve almost reached my goal. I also got rid of a quite a few books to reach this goal. There are some books I hope to get to before the end of the year to go even reached the 40 unread books. These are the ones I’m oping to read:

- Turtles all the way down by John Green

- Little men by Louisa May Alcott

- Landline by Rainbow Rowell

- Delusions of Gender: The real science behind sex differences by Cordelia Fine

- Anne of the Island by L.M. Montgomery

I also wanted to read more (actually) all the Brontë books, since I’ve only read Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights before. This year I didn’t manage to do that and read none of the Brontë books. I wasn’t in the mood for classics (see next challenge) and I read loads of children’s novels (Roald Dahl) instead. This meant I also dropped my read a classic a month challenge. I only read three so far. This means that out of the 45 unread books I still have 20 unread classics. This means that I have to read loads of classics next year to get my unread books even to a lower number. However, I did read some little black classics (well, one haha) and three little mint classics, so I think I can complete that challenge by the end of the year. Let me know if you’d like to see a review of those little classics. This year I already completed my goal of rereading at least 5 books. There’s a trilogy included, but I wanted to read 5 different novels. This means I have reread atleast two to actually complete the goal, but I don’t think I’m going to do that. I do want to reread A Walk To Remember in December, so maybe I can still complete it.

In conclusion I’ve almost completed three goals out of five and I already completed my Goodreads “challenge” (even though it’s more of a tracker for me than a challenge) of reading 30 books, so I didn’t do too bad this far. These are also goals that are more guidelines than actually goals, so I’m not that hard on myself. Reading is all about the fun and experience.

Next year I really want to read more Brontë and George Orwell and I was thinking about hosting a yearly Orwell readalong. Let me know if you're interested in that, so I can decide whether to do it or not. Even though it seems a long time before the year is about to end. One a few (eight!!) weeks left. 

What are your goals of 2018 and which did you already complete?

There are so many classics that we all love, and even more than the ones we all know about, so it’s time I share some of my favorite underrated classics. These four are the ones I also recommend, so add them to the list (let me know which ones you actually want to read after I’ve recommended them to you).

Emma by Jane Austen

The most read/favorite by Jane Austen is Pride and Prejudice, but I didn’t like it that much. Emma definitely is my favorite. (Haven’t read them all yet though). I love the message in this one (you don’t need a man to make you happy) and it’s really modern for its time being. I also love how funny Emma is. It’s not the most underrated classic on the list, but definitely one that doesn’t get that much attention as her other novels.

Burmese Days by George Orwell

Everyone reads Animal Farm/1984 first, because those two are his most well known novels, but I recommend Burmese Days. Most classics are set in the first world, but I love it that this one isn’t. It’s set in India and it’s about colonialism, but indeed from India’s perspective instead from our world. That’s why it makes this novel so unique.

A Little Princess by Frances Hodson Burnett

I’ve also read The Secret Garden by her, but I love this even more. I love the writing style, but most of all I love the message (be happy with what you have, even if that means “nothing”) and the main character. She’s so sweet and loving with the imaginative mind that a child has. Definitely a must read.

Lady Chatterley’s Lover by D.H. Lover

I really feel like this is a novel that many people don’t even know about, while it’s so so good. It made me feel (also because of the personal things the main character goes through) and it’s more than “just a novel about sex”. Because of that reason it has been banned many times and I also think that’s why many people don’t read it, but just do. It’s so sad and it deals with many moral decisions.

What is your favorite underrated classic?

As a child I haven’t read any Roald Dahl’s books (I did see some of the movies like The Witches and Charlie and the Chocolate factory), so when the boxset came out I decided to buy it. Since then I’ve been reading them and because I just finished it last month, I want to recommend you some lesser known ones.

There were three that stood out to me (beside the most famous one’s like The BFG, The Witches, James and the Giant Peach). 

Boy (his biography)

I loved the way Dahl wrote his children’s biography. I felt like a grandfather was telling his biography as he was growing up and how life was back then. You even see some pictures of Dahl in it, which was a really nice extra. 

The Magic Finger

It's a story about how humans shoot animals for food and a little girl doesn't like that and then she takes revenge on that family who is shooting and made sure they became victims in a sorta way to learn that it's not okay to shoot other living creatures. I love that message and that's why I recommend this one. 

The Twits

There are also a few that I didn’t end up liking. Mainly because I don’t support there themes. I wouldn’t recommend reading/starting with Esio’s Trot, George’s Marvellous Medicine and Danny and the Champion of the World because of that. I honestly don't have one or two favorites, there are so many I like. If you want to buy this set as well, I recommend you checking it out on TheBookPeople (no spon), because it really is the cheapest there. 

Which Roald Dahl’s are your favorite?

When I was looking for a tag to do, I came across this one. It's created by Beards and Books. This tag It is a perfect tag to catch up with you guys. It has a great variety of questions, so let’s get started.

Q1 - If you could pick a fictional world to live in, what world would you chose and why?

I don’t think there is any world I’d like to live in. Most of the books I read are heartbreaking contemporaries or classics and I don’t want to live in any world (the past doesn’t sound that intriguing to me, except for the landscape side but not the social side of those eras. If I have to choose I think maybe Little Women, because they have an awesome family sister bond and cosiness.

Q2 - What solo book and/or book series surprised you the most?

A recent read would definitely have to be To All The Boys I’ve Love before trilogy by Jenny Han. Never thought I would like this series as much as I did and it has loads of depth in it that I wasn’t expecting. A classic that I end up loving and wasn’t expecting at all was Lady Chatterley’s Lover. I thought it was going to be about sex (because it has been banned for that reason), but it’s not about that and I’m stil thinking about it very regularly. It ended up one of my favorite classics I’ve ever read.

Q3 - You can pick one author to meet, who would you chose and why?

Sarah Dessen, I think. I think she’d be a really cool author to chat with and talk about how she came up with all those stories and to get answers on which of these happen to her (and what characters she knew in real life and who they are based of etc.)

Q4 - If you could only ever read one genre of book for the rest of your life what genre would you chose and why?

Books that can happen in real life. I love realistic books. I didn’t say contemporary for a reason, because I love classics (that are also set in the real world) as well. Kind of cheating because I maybe mixed up two genres? Think so, but yea haha. I love dystopian too, but if you read too much of that genre it can get repetitive and the contemporary genre has many different subjects and sub genres.

Q5 - What genre do you rarely read, but wish you read more?

Definitely science-fiction. I love stories that are set in space, but I end up not reading them as much because I can’t I read it slowly and usually I can’t get really into the story because I can’t relate to it and it confuses me most of the time.

Q6 - What is the most intimidating book or book series you’re too nervous to begin?

Any book over 500 pages probably. I’m most intimidated to read any of the Brontë sisters, because I have so much hop in liking the other books since I loved Jane Eyre, but I’m afraid I might be disappointed. I’m also intimidated by the A Court of Thrones and Roses series, because I heard such mixed reviews (I only have the first two books) and I think I might end up not liking them for some reason.

Q7 - If you had to recommend one book and/or book series above all others what would that be?

There are so many that I love, so it’s hard to recommend just one. If I have to pick one then I guess that would have to be Lady Chatterley’s Lover. That one is just really underrated in my opinion.

Q8 - Final question, what are your reading plans & blog plans for the next six months?

I definitely want to read the Mara Dyer trilogy, The Hate You Give, Fingersmith, Coraline and Landline (I have some others I want to read as much but those will definitely happen). On my blog I have been posting every other Sunday for a few weeks now, so I really want to keep doing that. (If you have suggestions on what to post, please let me know!)

If you'd like to do this tag too, you're tagged by me. Leave your answers (link) in this post below so I can read it too. 

If you can pick one author to meet, who would you chose and why?

Since I've known about booktube and bookstagram I've been buying more books and my physical tbr kept going. Until this year, because I've been longing for a small physical tbr pile. Today I want to chat about those changes and also show you guys my currently physical tbr. 

It's a natural thing. Finding out about booktube and bookstagram and all of the sudden you see soooo many books you want to read so you just keep buying, reading and sharing. I've never bought and read that many books until that year. Because I live in a country where I can only buy Dutch books in stores and I don't have that many people around me who read books, I had the sudden urge of buying all the books and read them all. Because I couldn't go to the store and pick a book up, also wanted to have a big tbr pile so I could pick the one up that I was in the mood for. For those two years I read more than I've ever did. Also because I couldn't afford buying five or six books every month, I just bought around two or three each time. But then I didn't read that much anymore. 

I still bought two or three book each time, but my physical tbr stayed the same (as in the number) because I didn't read as much anymore. Now I have some books that I've owned for three years that I still haven't read and my excitement for them have changed a little bit. I still want to read all of the books I own, because I also got rid of many books (and that's a bit of a bummer right?!). 

So this year I've decided to getting rid of all the books I'm no longer interested in, that I'm not going to buy so many books, and that I want my physical tbr to slim down to under 40 books by the end of the year. I currently have 48 unread books (not included the many penguin little black and mint classics), but I'm interested in all of them and I have more free time to read because I'm doing an internship until the beginning of next year. This a goal I'm now going to achieve for sure. These are the 48 unread books (let me know which ones you'd like me to read first): 

My end goal is to have under ten unread books. I just want to order the one or two (I get them in just three days) and read them immediately when they arrive. I want to feel and keep the excitement for them and that's only possible when you just bought them, right?

Do you have a big or small physical tbr and what is your ideal one (and why)?

I haven't done a wrap-up since my 2017 overview one, so I thought it would be fun to do one of this year. There aren't that many books on the list, but it gives you a nice overview of what I've been reading lately. 

This year I've read 20 books so far, most of them are children's book and Young Adult. Three of them are rereads (Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, The Selection and Anne of Green Gables. Here's an overview of all the books I've read:

My favorite reads are (rereads not included) A Little Princess, To All the Boys I've Loved Before, Gender Games and. Why I'm not Going to Buy a Computer. I dnf'ed one book: Black Beauty and I gave most of the books four stars. As you can see I've been reading loads of Roald Dahl: I now only have one book left (Danny and the Champion of the World). Let me know if you'd like to see an author review/mash-up, only of all his childrens' books though. 

One of my goals this is year is to cut down my physical tbr. I want to get under 40 books and now I'm at 46 so I'm almost there. This was one of the reasons I've been reading shorter books. The other reason was that I was busy with school so when I had some free time I wanted to read shorter and/or lighter books. For the rest of the year I want to read bigger books and more classics. 

What is your favorite and least favorite read so far? 

I'm finally back, for real. Last year was a crazy year for me, with loads of design deadlines. That's why I couldn't read, so I also wasn't that much in the book community. But, now I finally can!

I've been on a break for a month now, but I just had to recover from all the design deadlines, so I wanted a break from all the deadlines and just relax. I finally have the time to read (yay!) and buy books. Last year I also posted that I was back, but school took more over that I ever thought. It was a crazy, but super awesome year (where I also started my own design business @ViennartDesigns and at the moment designing my own website), but so happy to be finally back. I have been reading quite a lot over the last month, getting rid of all the books I know I'm never going to read and also been buying some exciting ones. 

I also know I'll be back for sure now, because after summer break is over I'm going to do an internship where I'm going to design book covers (fulltime) until February! I can't tell where or what books I'm going to design because of their privacy, but you guys I'm so excited! I can't wait. This means I'm going to be super into the book community (like all the time) and I also have quite a few (creative) blogpost ideas. I'm not going to post bookhauls, tbr's and regular wrap-ups and such over here (but I'm going to on my Instagram page); only the creative, tags and chatty ones. My plan is to post every other Sunday at 3pm, starting from now. 

What have you been reading lately? 

As the creater of The Classics Book tag I never thought the tag would be so welcome on Booktube so I couldn’t believe it when it did. So many of you have done the tag as well and that way I found so, so many Booktubers that I still watch today.

When I started reading classics I was looking on Booktube for recommendations and Booktubers that weren’t talking about the popular young adult books and at that time I couldn’t find that many, so I decided to create this tag. It has now been more than three years since I posted it and even today I still see new videos of readers doing this tag. It is also inspiring to see that quite a few reader started a Booktube channel because of this tag. (If you haven’t seen/read my version yet, which I’m sure you already have, you can read it here).

I also never thought I would see this tag in so many different languages. I don’t know that many languages, so unfortunately I couldn’t watch them all. If you would like to watch all the videos and see the evolution of the tag, I (finally) created a playlist so now you can watch them all at once. Here’s the link to the playlist:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist? list=PLxTdj6OFcb2pO050P44iX3dkSnx6AZDPP

It will take you a few hours, because over two hundred readers have done it, so I just want to say thank you for getting excited to talk about all the classics!

Seeing my original post I think I might do an update, because I read so many classics ever since. If you have also done the tag as a blogpost, let me know because I haven’t been checking those out yet. 

I just want to say thank you to all of you who have done the tag and found out about the classic side of Booktube/blogger community. 

What is your favorite classic of all time and why?

This upcoming week I have vacation and it’s one of the first time in a while that I have no design/school projects and contemporary is one of my favorite genre, so of course I have to participate. This ReadAThon is hosted by www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZ0llgtJpQI (and many more) and it will run from the 12th ‘till the 18th.

These are the challenges:

1. Newly acquired contemporary

2. Contemporary book with pink on the cover

3. Read a hyped contemporary

4. Read a diverse contemporary

5. Read a dark or taboo contemporary

6. Read a contemporary graphic novel

7. Read a contemporary that was recommended to you

I’m not going to read seven books, so I combined some of the challenges. This is my tbr with the challenges that they belong to:

Landline by Rainbow Rowell (#2)

When Dimple met Rishi by Sandya Menon (#3, #4 and #7)
The Hate You Give by Angie Thomas (#1, #5, #7)

If I Was Your Girl by Meredith Russo (#1, #3, #4, #7).

I’m not going to do challenge 6 because I don’t read/have graphic novels and I changed challenge 7 to a book that was recommended by Booktube, because none of these have been recommended to me personally.

Are you going to participate in this ReadAThon? Post your tbr (in a link or as a comment) down below.

So here are all the books I read this year, including some fun statistics. This year I really took the time to read the books I really want to read, but also to read some random ones. I didn't care for the number and I feel like I finally remember more about the stories because I took the time to read them. Here are all my reads of 2017:

- I read 24 books in total;

- I read 6717 pages in total;

- The shortest book I read was Legend and has 53 pages;

- The longest book I read was Our Dark Duet (510 pages);

- The average page number was 280;

- The most popular book I read was Harry Potter and the Philosopher Stone;

- My least popular book was Popism by Andy Warhol;

- My average rating was 4.0/5.0 which isn't bad at all! Really pleased with that number;

- My top favorite books were probably Dreamland by Sarah Dessen, Boy by Roald Dahl, We have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson, Lady Chatterley's Lover by D.H. Lawrence and Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowell;

- My most disappointed reads of 2017 were Popism by Andy Warhol and Fortunately, the milk by Neil Gaiman.

What is your favorite and your most disappointed book of the year?

It's been a long time since I've shown you the books I bought this year, so I thought it would be fun to do an overview of all the books I bought this year. There aren't that many, because reading wasn't that much of a priority this year (I'll post a 2017 wrap-up soon). Here are all the books I bought with some fun statistics. 

- In total I've bought twenty books. 

- From which I've read only seven this year.

- One I bought but I already read that one before, but wanted to have this beautiful edition (Emma)

- One book I couldn't resist because of the cover (Fear of Flying).

- Two books I bought because I wanted to watch the tv show of it as well. Sadly one of those I didn't like as much so I stopped watching and the other one I did manage to read it (Thirteen Reasons Why), but still haven't watched the show (The Handmaid's Tale). 

-  I bought the book by Rudyard Kipling in Barcelona while I was on vacation for only one euro, which means that that is the cheapest book I bought.

- The most expensive book I bought was the illustrated Harry Potter edition.

- I bought all the books during the first half of the year, the other half I was on a ban (because of a bet, but I didn't mind it at all so I won haha). 

- I've been wanting to read all of them as soon as I got them, but sadly I didn't (as happens with every booklover haha). 

I've been wanting to post this haul earlier in the month, but then I forgot to bring a book that I had in my boyfriend's house while the rest were at my parent's house and there were times were I totally forgot I bought some books this year as well. So here it finally is! Tomorrow I'll show you all the books I read this year (also with some interesting facts).

How many books did you buy this year and how many of those did you manage to read?

Next post I'll be showing you how many and what books I bought in 2017, but I thought it would be fun to already show you my wishlist for 2018. Actually I want to buy all of these now, but I have had a ban from this summer 'till the end of 2017. 

I really want to read more novels that have become famous because of their musicals, such as Phantom of the Opera and Wicked. I also want to read more books about gender and you can never have to much young adult. I really want to complete my Rainbow Rowell (the ones I still want at least) and Sarah Dessen collection. There are also two movies coming out next year that I want to read the book beforehand (Wrinkle in Time and To All the Boys I've Loved before) and as soon my ban is over I know I'm going to get the two missing (in my collection) illustrated Harry Potter editions. So these are all the books I really want to get:

I've already The Perks of Being a Wallflower and Lady Chatterley's Lover, but I don't have a copy of The Perks of Being a Wallflower because I read that one on my ereader (that I no longer own) and I want to reread it in 2018 and I want to get this edition of Lady Chatterley's Lover because the one I own is hideous and it's one of my favorites books I read this year (spoiler for my wrap-up).

What books do you have on you wishlist that you already had in your collection?

Even though we saw ‘’the cover doesn’t matter, it’s about the story’’ we are drawn to them. When their are more editions of one book, we go for the prettiest cover. When we’re browsing online and find a beautiful cover, we want to buy it immediately. Today I want to share the books I bought because of their beautiful cover. All of these covers have something so special about them, that I just had to buy them, but what made them so special for me?

I love this edition of Jane Eyre, because it matches the story. The black (and design) fits with her character and the red pages matches the ‘’red room’’ (it’s a big deal of the story). I didn’t find any other cover that matches the story perfectly (except for the Penguin Deluxe edition and yes I want that one too). Speaking of Penguin Deluxe: they have such awesome fitting covers (+ deckled edges and the quality of the paper etc. is just awesome). Fear of Flying by Erica Young is just designed so well (and is a funny one too). And let’s not talk about the Word Cloud classics (the quotes on their cover and their deluxe feeling to it is just amazing, and for the price too (can I have more please)).

Other classics edition I was immediately drawn to are the Puffin Chalks and the Vintage Children editions. The illustrations one those covers are just so well done and creative (and I love the art style as well). The covers also match to perfectly because of the fact that they are children’s classics so children are drawn to those editions as well (future children: read them too! haha).

There are not so many modern books I bought because of their cover. I think that has to do with the fact that I just buy them because there aren’t that many editions of them and because I just bought them because of the story and didn’t care as much for the cover. However, there are two in my collection that I did buy because of the cover: the dutch edition of Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien, Everything Leads to You by Nina LaCour and Illuminae by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff. I love the simplicity but yet so perfectly fitting of the Lord of the Rings ones, Every Leads to You is just so beautiful because of the font choice (and the pink and the back of the girl instead of the front (let’s just say there’s nothing bad to say about the cover) and the design of Illuminae is just so awesome. The dust jacket is just so cleverly designed (and the cover itself too).

What are some of the books you bought because of their cover?