Tagged: book blog

20 Books of Summer 2025

A refreshed 20 Books of Summer challenge is upon us! Unlike last year, I do have 20 books to choose from, but it’s more realistic for me to commit to ten. My most successful 20 Books of Summer was my first, in 2019, when I read and reviewed 14 books, but I’ve never come close to that again. I join this challenge as an intention: to read these books (eventually) and to spend time writing reviews during the summer.

This year, new hosts have taken over for Cathy. I for one welcome our new overlords, AnnaBookBel and Words and Peace.

My list is another random assortment of books in my house or that could be in my house soon:

  1. Less by Andrew Sean Greer (cheating because I’m halfway through it now)
  2. The Netanyahus by Joshua Cohen (carry over from last year)
  3. Athena by John Banville (the last in the Book of Evidence series)
  4. Small Boat by Vincent Delacroix tr. Helen Stevenson (an IBP shortlister)
  5. There’s a Monster Behind the Door by Gaëlle Bélem tr. Karen Fleetwood and Laëtitia Saint-Loubert (an IBP longlister)
  6. Playing Hard by Peter Unwin (a review copy, a collection of essays about games and sports)
  7. Don Quixote by Cervantes tr. Edith Grossman (I thought about doing a read along but I’m too lazy)
  8. Mornings Without Mii by Mayumi Inaba tr. Ginny Tapley Takemori (cover buy!)
  9. Yoga by Emmanuel Carrère tr. John Lambert (been on my TBR since I read this review)
  10. On the Calculation of Volume II by Solvej Balle tr. Barbara Haveland (next in the septology)

Join in and let’s review some books! I promise to comment on yours if you promise to comment on mine.

20 Books of Summer 2024

20 Books of Summer has always been more about the motivation to *actually review* books for me, not reducing my TBR, and never more so than this year. I don’t own 20 books, let alone 20 books I haven’t read before. Hence the shorter list.

This year is special though, as it’s the tenth anniversary of an event that started as a TBR challenge with 8 participants that now attracts upwards of 100 bloggers each year. No mean feat given the state of blogging today and the fact that this is a rather high-commitment event (with very relaxed rules to make it manageable.) Congratulations to Cathy for keeping the pages turning and the reviews rolling in since 2014. 

My list of 15 has no theme other than “these are books in my house or that I might get into my house at some point this summer”:

  1. Breasts and Eggs by Mieko Kawakami tr. Sam Bett and David Boyd (for Women in Translation month, perhaps)
  2. The Wars by Timothy Findley (a CanLit classic)
  3. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith (an American classic)
  4. The Netanyahus by Joshua Cohen (has been recommended to me many a time)
  5. Agnes Grey by Anne Brontë (the book I was rereading at the time of our house fire, apologies to Edmonton Public Library for the lost copy!)
  6. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë (it’s in the edition I got in order to read Agnes)
  7. Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë (see above and it’s time for a reread anyway)
  8. Ghosts by John Banville (the next in the Book of Evidence series)
  9. Brooklyn by Colm Tóibín (a rare instance of “seen the movie, not read the book” and preparation for…)
  10. Long Island by Colm Tóibín (the much-anticipated sequel)
  11. Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck tr. Michael Hofmann (my tradition of reading the International Booker Prize winners continues)
  12. Laser Quit Smoking Massage by Cole Nowicki (a slim essay collection)
  13. A Year of Last Things by Michael Ondaatje (a slim poetry collection)
  14. When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chödrön (they sure have been)
  15. The Tenderness of Wolves by Stef Penney (a Little Free Library pick)

Join in and let’s get this TBR back down to zero, or at least review some books this summer!

Blogging by numbers

It’s time to dig deep, and peel back the layers on Reading in Bed. Yep, we’re looking at blog statistics*!

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When you check your blog stats and realize no one is reading your carefully crafted, 2,000 word review of an obscure backlist book

I recently hit a significant milestone over on YouTube. 500 subscribers. Halfway to an almost-medium-sized-Booktube-account, still absolutely nothing in the larger YouTube ecosystem.

YouTube is all about the “like and subscribe”, but bloggers don’t really talk about follower counts or number of likes. I can easily find out who the big Booktube accounts are (or try the new Booktuber Catalog on Discord, learn more here), but it’s difficult to get a read on book blogs (there’s this list, but it doesn’t differentiate between corporate entities – like, yeah, Book Riot is riddled with typos, but it’s not *actually* a blog).

So in the interest of opening up a dialogue, and because I’m nosy as hell and hope that some of you out there decide to share a bit, here’s a peek at where I’m at with ye olde bloge: Continue reading →