 I have missed doing the monthly reading statistics, so let's just get into it. Hello my loves, welcome back to my channel. Today it is time for my January wrap up, a little bit delayed because I've been ill. Excuse me again if I sound annoying today, it's still there. So yeah it's time for a wrap up. I didn't do wrap ups for November or December just because I was so busy with like end of year content and then beginning of year content but we're back. We're back with the wrap ups, I'm very happy to say. If you don't know how my wrap up videos work, how we do it is that first we go through all the reading statistics, then I show you all the books I've read but I just show them and tell you the ratings and then we talk more in depth about my disappointment, surprise and hits. This is just a more fun way for me of doing the video because if I had to speak about every book again I would go insane or I was going insane doing that for wrap up. So I just think it's a bit more spicy just talking about the books that really had an impact this month, whether it was good or bad. So let's not waste any time, let's just get into it. I'm ready to go. I'm so excited for the statistics of the year. So in January I did really well on getting ahead on my Goodreads goal, getting ahead on the reading goal for the year. I read a total of 15 books. Now we will see quite a few of them are what I would class as short stories. I think maybe three or four of them were short stories which were between 10 and 30 pages each, okay? They were very short but they're on Goodreads so it counts, okay? That's how it works. These were short stories that were related to two different series I'm currently reading. I've never read these short stories. I don't usually make time for them like these little extra parts of series I'm currently reading but this month I did and it helped me get ahead on my goal. So my pages read was 3,071, that means an average pages per day of 99 so as you can begin to tell even though I read a lot of books, books. I didn't read a ton of pages per say because that's a little bit under I like to read on average 100 pages per day. So the average book length was 204 pages. So like I said there's at least three books on here that were like 10 pages each so has brought the average down. My average rating was 3.94 which is pretty high like getting close to 4 especially for how many books I read I think is pretty high and the average time a book had spent on my TBR was three months. I had a lot of books that I classed as zero months on my TBR be that the short stories because I've never really planned on reading them before and I just picked them up this month. Four books that I read this month were rereads for the Wayward Children series. I still need to reread the last three that I haven't reread. I'm doing a vlog on my Patreon for it. I was planning on reading them at the end of January but then I got sick so I need to read them at some point in February. Now February's a product I'm behind on February stuff so I don't know quite what I'm gonna get around to them but sometime in February I will so I get the vlog up but yeah three months is super short for average time on TBR but that's because there was a lot that was zero and then oh I'm so excited for my new spreadsheet to see what these stats are let's get into it. In terms of genre I read six fantasy one horror one magical realism two mystery four sci-fi three of them were short stories and one thriller so yeah a lot of fantasies month four of those are the Wayward Children series oh no five because I read one short story for the Wayward Children series as well so yeah a lot of fantasy is skewed by the Wayward Children series but listen I had quite a good mix rating I read two 2.5s three three stars two three point fives two four stars and six five stars but again three of those six five stars so half of them were rereads for the Wayward Children series. In terms of the source that I read two were just audiobooks four were ebooks five were physical books and four were a mixture so that's pretty typical I would say apart from the ebooks obviously that was the short stories that I read this month because I got them just all on websites I don't typically read a ton of ebooks but yeah I'd say like a fair amount that I just read physically some that I had both the audiobook and the physical book I think one of the audiobooks that I classed as was The Weight of Blood which I do own physically but I pretty much just read the entire thing via the audiobook because I was enjoying the audiobook so much. In terms of audience 13 were adult and two were YA again I'm tending to read a lot more adult books now. In terms of format seven were novels four novellas and four were short stories so there's no short stories that I've been chatting about. In feature months this will probably all be novels do you know what I mean? I don't typically read a ton of novellas or short stories I just did this month because of the whereabouts when we read and my son's desire to read those short stories. In terms of where the books were from one was from Book of the Month one was gifted seven were books that I'd bought myself one was from the publisher one was from Scribd and four I got online. In terms of series stats eight were part of a series four were standalone and three were first in series but out of the ones that were first in series I'm not continuing with the Death and Croissants series one of them was Every Heart a Doorway which was a reread and then one was Legends and Lattes which I am going to continue so only one new series started this month. In terms of author stats one was a debut 11 books were from authors I've read from before and three authors were new to me. Okay that is my reading stats let's get into chatting quickly about all of the books I read this month. So in the order that I read them we have Legends and Lattes which I gave five stars Death and Croissants by Ian Moore which I gave three stars five survive by Holly Jackson which I gave 2.5 stars then I had my wayward children reread where I well I started it we have Every Heart a Doorway and Down Among Sticks and Bones by Sean McGuire which I gave five stars then I read the audiobook for Beneath the Sugar Sky which I gave four stars we have In an Absent Dream which I gave five stars then I read the short story Deuce Like Runes by Sean McGuire which I gave four stars then I started reading some short stories for the Sleeping Giant series. Is that what it's called or is it called something else? Oh the Themis Files yeah I read some of the short stories from The Themis Files by Sylvain Nouvelle so I read file number two which I gave 3.5 stars then I read The Weight of Blood by Tiffany D Jackson which I gave five stars then I read two more of the Themis Files short stories I read file number 247 which I gave three stars and file number 1743 which I also gave three stars I read The Echo Wife by Sarah Gayley which I gave 3.5 stars The Cartographers by Peng Shepard which I gave 2.5 stars and finally The Burning Issue of the Day by T.E. Kinsey next to the Lady Hardcastle Mystery series which I gave five stars okay that is all the books let's chat about disappointment surprises and hits now okay I would say my biggest disappointment by far I don't even want to talk about it can we just pretend this didn't happen it's Five Survived by Holly Jackson which I gave 2.5 I can't even look at the wall without sad pics I did a whole reading vlog for this which you can go watch if you want to see my disappointment I just want to say a few things from that video that I feel like I because that I was sleep deprived you don't know I read this from 10 p.m to 6 a.m firstly I know my reading one enough to know that if I had read this during the day or not in that kind of challenge format I would have still given it 2.5 stars secondly I did that video because it generally did not cross my mind that this could be anything less than a four star like that did not even enter like my consciousness I don't think I would have done it otherwise I don't think I would have put myself through that I love the good girl's guy to murder series where is she oh it's up there I loved that so much it is one of my favorite series I think her writing was incredible in that series and it just feels like someone else wrote this I feel so bad okay and I was gonna update the the vlog in the morning had I had any different thoughts but I didn't I still feel the same way about this this is a like sniper thriller where these six characters are on this what is it called an RV yeah they're on this RV their tires get blown out and they soon find out there's a sniper wanting to kill them unless a secret is revealed essentially I just thought I mean I have so many problems with it I didn't feel like the writing was great the pacing for a book that is supposed to take place over such a short period of time it felt so dragged out like the pacing was not quick it was not exciting the characters felt very one-dimensional the plot twists were not twisting push me up against the wall give me a kiss then I might get excited for me everything felt really obvious I said in it like once you found out one piece of information you knew what was gonna get revealed next I can't believe that the resolution of this was what it was this was just I mean this is disappointment upon disappointment I have not had a disappointment like this for a long time and then I would say my other disappointment was the cartographers by Peng Sheppard I gave those 2.5 stars as well this is about a girl who her whole family has been into map making she was supposed to go into map not map making map study I guess if she was supposed to go into this like cartography like her dad but they had this big argument and he demanded that she be fired from the public library where all the cartographers were and now he's dead and it is he is it natural causes or is something deeper going on and this is magical realism right but I don't that doesn't really begin to halfway through it's class is magical realism or good reason everything but like it takes a while to get there this one I remember saying I read this in a video where I read books that TVL Cluedo had picked for me and I remember feeling like I just kept oscillating between being really into it like for 10 pages like okay okay but I'm so into this what's gonna happen I'm so into it like let's read let's read and then having no interest in being bored and not wanting to pick it up it was a very strange book and the ending I understand why everyone doesn't like the ending I don't think it's necessarily a bad but I did tell a bit of a lie there it leaves a reader feeling unsatisfied because all these characters have made sacrifices and have gone through really painful stuff through the rest of the book and the ending kind of means that that was all for nothing and it leaves you feeling a bit like oh well okay I think it's a pretty forgettable book as well I don't think I'll be thinking about this at the end of the year I wouldn't say I had a ton of surprises this month because a lot of my reading was obviously rereads but this one is a surprise but it's also a hit so it's um it falls under both it's a way to bridge the two but this is the only surprise I would say I had this month The Weight of Blood by Tiffy D Jackson I read this in the same vlog that I read the cartographers I loved this me and Tiffy D Jackson it's a surprise right because I've to this day I'd previously only given Tiffy Jackson a three star or a 2.5 star maybe even like a two and I always felt like me and her could get it like I always felt like me and her could click you know because I love her synopses she has some of my favorite synopses this is a Carrie retelling and I loved it you know what's the most exciting thing about winning it's when you win I love that feeling I thought the audiobook for this was great I just listened to the audiobook for this I loved it so we're following a girl who has been trying to pass as white she's mixed race and it gets revealed that she's black and she lives in this town that is very racist has ingrained racial inequalities and there's this it rolls around the prom and previously they'd had segregated proms they've got their first integrated prom and I just loved it you know that there's this big event that happens at the end where she may kill a lot of people I don't believe in the glorification of murder I do believe in the empowerment of women that I loved the podcast as a podcast kind of interspersed not too much throughout this kind of talking about what she did and what really happened and we follow a lot of different characters a lot of different storylines I really liked the way it jumped between them I thought the writing was great I really loved Maddie as a character she's lived a very sheltered life her dad it's the one who's forced her to pass as white and he's very racist and he's taught her a lot of untruths and I was just captivated by this book I loved it I loved it so yeah it was a surprise kind of but I'd always had this ingrained belief that me and Tiffany D Jackson could get along and it finally happened and then we have two hits of the month I'm not including the way we're children series reread and there's obviously because it's a reread so I'm only talking about new books my biggest hit of the month was by far legends and lattes by Travis Baldry this was my first book of the year I read it in a vlog where I picked the first book of the year by doing a tri chapter because I have a superstition that in order to have a good year my first book of the year has to be five stars it's a conspiracy theory that I'm actually interested in every year since I've been reading again since what 2018 bar last year I've had a five star as my first book of the year or I think one year was a 4.5 that's close enough and I loved this we don't know by now this is about an orc who opens up a coffee shop and it's cozy fantasy and I just loved it I love the descriptions of making coffee and cooking these like bakery cakes I thought it's still people say it's low stakes and I think it is low stakes because people are not getting like murdered outright and we haven't got war but there is still enough stakes to keep you interested to keep you intrigued to keep you concerned for our main character because you want everything to go well I love the characters thimble I rarely love a character as much as I loved thimble oh my god I love thimble I just want to protect thimble forever it felt warm it felt cozy it felt comforting this is definitely going to be in contention for my top 10 books of the year I loved it I just can't get over how much I loved it I'm so excited there is a prequel coming out at the end of the year I think called I think it's bookshops and bone dust or bone dust and bookshop something like that but I'm a bit concerned because I don't think that that is a prequel obviously and our main character the orc was previously kind of like she worked on like adventuring like being people up like war kind of like yes I loved so much about this the setting at the coffee shop but I'm like oh shit what is it like was it gonna be like being in the prequel I don't know so I am really excited but I'm nervous but I just loved this I loved it so much it felt like every word was intentional every sentence was there for a reason and I love that in books and then my final hit I don't know if this will be in contention for top 10 books of the year but I had a great time reading it The Burning Issue of the Day by T. E. Kinsey this is the fifth yeah one two three four five the fifth in the wayward the wayward children the fifth in the Lady Hardcastle Mysteries this is my favorite cozy mystery series my following Lady Hardcastle and her made flow is narrated from a place perspective they have a much closer relationship than Lady and Maid would traditionally they've been together for many years Lady Hardcastle is it a spoiler I don't think so they previously were like spies they have all these crazy stories from their past life that are scattered throughout but now they've kind of moved to the countryside to retire but they have moved to the murder hot spot of the world so they're always kind of being asked to investigate stuff together and flow is really funny their relationship is really funny I love the writing in these they'd kind of just a comfort read for me at this point particularly the audiobooks as well I love the audiobooks for these so much I'm gonna try and read this one set in January I'm gonna try and read this year all the other books like when they're kind of set around that time there's a lot set in the summer like the next three I think I'll set in the summer so I might have to like read the one that's set in July and May maybe space it out a bit but in this one they are helping a group of suffragettes one of them has been accused of murder but her friends are saying that she didn't do it and so they're kind of investigating the situation I just love it like it's just I mean what is that to say I love the writing I think it has this warmth again this joy this coziness to it that I just love I want to kind of finish or get up to date with this series before I start another cozy mystery series and to me it's just the best if you want to start cozy mysteries and they're interested in this one particularly with like a historical twist I would really recommend the audiobooks I don't think pick up them physically I think get the audiobooks they are on script I have a link down below I think you can get two months free of script if you want so I love I love I love them I protect lady hardcast and flow for the rest of my life they're just fun you know they're just fun palette cleansers enjoyable treat and I love them so there we have it that was my January wrap up I hope you enjoyed it let me know what you thought of any of the books that I have mentioned I'll leave all the vlogs I posted in January linked down below where you can see some of these books read in greater detail if you got to the end of the video comment the newspaper like any kind of newspaper burning issue of the day emoji or fire emoji comment that down below if you got to the end thank you guys so much for watching I'll see you very soon in another video bye