Hey y’all! I’m coming up on my 3 year anniversary of starting this blog (4ish if you count the blog I had before this that was much lesser known) and I don’t think I’ve ever done any kind of introduction of myself or “get to know you” tag. Mostly because I didn’t think anyone would actually read this blog, and/or read it enough to care anything about who I am and not just the content itself. 😂

I still kind of feel that way, but I’ll throw this out there because at least one person (Dini @Dinipandareads, who tagged me — thanks doll!) might care, and I’ll have some fun writing it up. So, let’s begin. 😊

Rules:

Thank the blogger who tagged you
Mention the creator Lauren @ Lala’s Book Reviews
Tag as many (or as few) people as you’d like
Have fun and get to know one another!

Introduction – who dis?

Sup y’all, it’s a-me, Mario — wait, no, it’s me, Jennifer. Right now I have a bad cold and it’s making me a little loopy, but this is not far off of my usual self anyway. xD I usually introduce myself by talking about how much I love reading but I think that’s kind of obvious. So instead I’ll do the ol’ classic two truths and a lie game and y’all can guess in the comments which is the lie.

I’ve never broken a bone… of my own
I’ve never eaten from McDonalds
I’ve never dyed my hair

Something most everyone wants to know… do you have any pets?

UH WELLLL!! I recently got my first-ever puppy! I haven’t had a pet as an adult ever — hey guess what? My puppy just barked to come inside, like she knew I was “talking” about her. 🤣 Anyway, yes, I have a new puppy! Currently she’s almost 5 months old and is an English Cream Golden Retriever. Now that she’s a little more chill, she’ll sleep by my side in the early morning while I read. 🙂

What is your favorite thing to drink?

If we’re defining favorite as the thing I drink most often then it’s room temperature tap water. xD If it’s something that’s a special treat that I really look forward to and enjoy, it’s basically any fruit smoothie from Edible Arrangements. There was one nearby an old workplace that I adored, and I’m sad I can’t walk over to one anymore. 😦

What is your favorite season?

SUMMER SUMMER SUMMER SUMMER SUMMER. I want to be warm and spend tons of time outside and have sunshine on my skin and wear easy flowing dresses and swim in cool water and eat tons of ice cream. Admittedly, I do that last one all year round. The one downside: bugs.

Do you have any special talents?

I can make a really loud high-pitched squeak. Most people do not enjoy it, so I do it much less frequently as an adult than I did as a child. Once a year or so I’ll let loose just to see if I can still do it. I think this is more of an oddity than a talent.

B-B-B-BLOGGIN’!

When and why did you start your blog?

As mentioned earlier, I started it in May-Juneish of 2019, though I had one prior before I moved to this one. I started it because my previous one was more of an online journal for myself (since no one read it and I didn’t care about views and whatnot) with weekly updates on books I was reading and thoughts about the books so far. I still wanted to track my reading and have a space dedicated to my organized thoughts about books.

I decided to try WordPress since it’s wildly popular, and to see if I could leverage a nicer-looking blog with any form of stats to get free books. Come on, now. Isn’t that at least part of why anyone starts a book blog? A R Cs! A R Cs! I started this blog for me, baby! Y’all are just a perk. 🙂

What is something that you wish you knew about blogging when you first started?

I wish I knew that book tags and weekly memes are the easiest way to get introduced to the actual community and meet other book bloggers. I just clunked along doing my own thing and letting people show up if they stumbled upon it and happened to stick around. It’s only recently that I’ve started doing tags and memes and things, and it has been wonderful. ^.^

What has been the hardest part about blogging?

Honestly, nothing. Because this blog is ultimately for me (I know, I’m saying that a lot, but it’s important –), I put pretty much zero pressure on myself. I write what I want to write because I enjoy doing it. I write when I want to write, but more importantly I don’t write when I don’t want to, because I want to continue to enjoy doing it. I posted every day for a year straight, including days I was sick, on vacation, and just plan didn’t feel like it. But I did it as a personal goal because I wanted to. And that is the entire reason that I’m still doing it several years on despite being notoriously flaky with my hobbies.

The one thing that was the trickiest for me from a technical side, though, was looking into self-hosting. I don’t think I care to do that much maintenance, and I don’t want to monetize or overly customize my site, so my own domain is enough to make me happy and not deal with the rest of it.

What has been the most rewarding part of blogging?

I love having a reason to write. I have no interest in writing fiction, but by god do I love words. And sometimes after reading a really incredible (or atrocious) book, I feel so inspired to string some words together myself and enjoy the craft of it all, while reflecting on that book in the process. And now I have the added perk of other people sometimes chiming in! That’s all pretty wonderful. I also very much enjoy re-reading my old posts, because I’ll forget what I wrote and it usually makes me laugh. 😊

Do you write your posts ahead of time or write them the day of posting?

Most posts are written day-of. For ones that are time dependent, like publish day posts, reviews of ARCs, or seasonal in some way, I’ll usually write them ahead of time and have them scheduled to go up. Once upon a time, I wrote all my Fast Forward Friday posts for a month ahead of time. Now it’s as likely to be posted on Saturday as on Friday. 😅

Reading

Who are your top 5 favorite authors?

According to my most-read-authors-all-time stats on StoryGraph, it’s these folks:

But I disagree that my most-read authors means they’re my favorite authors (even though I’m the only one who said that…). After all, Shakespeare is cool but most of that was for school. And I recently realized I might not like Sarah J Maas all that much. So even if I’ve only read one book by an author… who do I like the most?

Christopher Paolini – because Eragon is a forever-favorite and my basis of dragonhood
S. A. Chakraborty – because I finished the whole 1500+ page trilogy of City of Brass in about 20 days and bought physical copies of each book which I rarely do and it was SO SO SOSOSOOSOSOS GOOD
Jenny Lawson – because she always makes me laugh and I read at least one of her books at least once every year when I’m having a rough time
Orson Scott Card – because he’s one of very very few authors who I will read basically anything by, and also because his books narrated by Stefan Rudnicki are what got me to give audiobooks a try. Card’s words with Rudnicki’s voice skill? PERFECT.
Billy Shakes, aka William Shakespeare – because damn does he have some bangers! From 11-year-old me sneaking onto my brother’s computer to find a copy of A Midsummer Night’s Dream all the way to current me reading the Manga Classics adaptation of Macbeth every year, followed by the original, because it’s so good I have to read it again.

What genre do you read the most?

Let’s go back to Storygraph for a moment here:

That “classics” category in #5 is because I’m an English major and teacher

Young adult, for sure. Reading about teenagers and early-20s age characters is fun because so much is new for them, and that’s a delightful experience. Plus it reminds me of when things were new for me. Fantasy because dragons are dope AF. Romance because falling in love is a uniquely wonderful experience and I like having it over and over vicariously.

What genre surprised you by how much you love it?

Regency romances, with all that proper etiquette and actually pretty sexist gender roles. I did not think I’d be able to suffer the gender role issues with that time period and genre, but so far I’ve read ones that had characters who broke the mold there and supported decency in human interactions. Notorious by Minerva Spencer got me into it, but A Lady’s Guide to Fortune-Hunting by Sophie Irwin (out Jul 12, 2022) was excellent and I wanted to re-read it immediately after I finished it.

Which popular book didn’t live up to the hype for you?

Ugh, I hate it so much I almost don’t even want to mention it here and give it yet another person talking about it. >.>

Circe.

This book was book of the year in a lot of locations, and voted as best fantasy, and heaped with praise, and it was a piece of crap (at least compared to what I was promised). This book was so boring that it made me angry, because the story and character is so awesomely cool and yet Miller made it annoyingly whiny and dry as a bone. UUUUUUUUGH.

Who are some popular authors you haven’t read?

Oh ho ho! Well I happen to have a post from recently that is almost exactly this question, but some highlights are Brandon Sanderson, Stephen King, and V.E. Schwab (who I technically started to read and stopped because I was so not into it).

What upcoming release are you excited to read?

Let me please direct you once again to my Fast Forward Friday posts, which are exactly this. 😂 But here are a few further out:

6/7/22
7/12/22
8/16/22
10/11/22

Do you listen to music while reading?

Nope. I usually read in silence, although I’m also very good at tuning out everything around me when I’m reading. Subway trains, neighborhood people, my boyfriend gaming… none of it tends to register with me if I’m really into a book. I think lyrical music would be weird while reading since I’m already focusing on words.

Where else can we find you online?

Honestly, not many places. I’m not very involved outside of this blog and Goodreads. My Instagram is updated once or twice a month, and Twitter is just a feed of links to posts here. 🤷‍♀️ I’m a writer, not a social-media-er.