Hello!

I think I can say it officially – I’m burnt out.

I’ve had a manic couple of weeks and I think I’ve just crashed out in the most literal sense – it’s been a few days of not getting off the sofa, not having energy for cooking and uncontrollable naps. So reading hasn’t been going particularly well this week!

Luckily I’ve been rereading one of my favourite book series from when I was a teenager, meaning it’s got relatively large font, it’s really fast paced and for some reason I can read this book way quicker than my usual speed so I can get through more pages than I would in any other book! But when I finished that book, it was a bit slower going!

Let me tell you about the books I did finish!

Considering this last week has probably been my quietest week of the month so far, I wasn’t expecting to be able to read as much as I had in the other weeks where I was driving for literally hundreds of miles, but I think the timing worked out that I was close to the end of an audiobook and the aforementioned easy-to-read book!

The first full week of October I finished 3 books, the second week I finished 2 and the fact that I maintained finishing another 2 books makes me feel like this is an achievable goal to aim for! Especially considering I always have two books on the go – one audiobook and one eye-reading book (whether it’s paperback, hardback or ebook), I think I can do this! But then my next audiobook is nearly 15 hours long and the paperback book is way out of my comfort zone so watch it not happen this week 😂

Anyway, here’s what I did finish this week!

The last book I needed to read to be up to date on Holly Jackson’s backlist and it definitely wasn’t my favourite – the concept was cool and her writing is always wonderfully sarcastic and funny, but there was a character that really irritated me and made the whole experience really unenjoyable. The ending really did redeem the story but I just couldn’t justify rating it more than 3 stars because he was so annoying and the middle of the story felt so slow.

I still liked it, because it’s Holly Jackson and she’s brilliant, but unfortunately it was my least favourite. I’m glad to be up to date on the backlist though!

Rereading this series has been one of the highlights of my year and I’m hoping to be able to be able to finish at least the ones I own physically by the end of the year.

I didn’t remember anything really about this book and the setting kind of took me by surprise! This is the shortest book of the series so far and it’s the first one that didn’t give me the 5 star feeling. Don’t get me wrong, it was still a solid 4 star book but I didn’t feel like it had the same purpose – the end of book 3 was where they took out a huge antagonist and in this book we didn’t know who was the enemy for the majority of it. But, as always, I credit James Patterson’s narrative choices for main character Max as to why I lean so heavily on sarcasm, I love this found family with my whole heart and reliving it all has been the highlight of my year for sure.

Now that I’ve finished my monthly TBR I’m back to reading from my book queue!

Charlie, Love and Cliches has been on my list for about 6 months – I picked it from my TBR jar for a tiktok video and haven’t had the chance to read it but the time is now! I really hope I like it because I’ve been anticipating it for so long now 😂

I’m only a couple of hours into the audiobook and it’s a little bit stereotypical and cringy, but in the way that feels endearing and fun rather than awkward and not funny. It’s a really easy to listen story and while I’m a bit dubious as to why it’s nearly 15 hours long (which feels long for a contemporary romance!) I’m looking forward to listening to more of it next week.

The Silver Eyes is a book from the TBR my husband set for me (we’re doing a reading challenge where we’re essentially racing to see who can read a TBR set by the other first!) and, don’t get me wrong, I’ve not picked it up first because I’m excited about it, but exclusively because it feels seasonally appropriate for Halloween. I’m nervous about it but so far (meaning: the one chapter I’ve read) it’s been pleasantly surprising – it’s YA, the main character is also called Charlie which feels like an odd coincidence, and the first chapter is the kind of story that sucks you straight in without faffing with introductions. I must admit I’m intrigued to continue!

I decided against making a YouTube video this week because I’m so low energy and I’m trying to be smarter about how much pressure I put on myself for making content considering this is meant to be a fun hobby!

I did manage a few tiktoks though:

Monday – best and worst books of each month

Wednesday – unboxing my new Hannah Grace book!

Saturday – making a TBR inspired by my cat

Tonight I’m posting ‘The Lightning Thief’: book to musical adaptation review!

And I try to post every day on my Instagram!

I’ve definitely had a quieter week than last week – after such a manic weekend (which definitely cemented the burnout), this week has been mostly recovery.

On Monday, my husband and I had a very chilled day and started playing the new Pokemon Legends Z-A game and just chilled – I’m not a massive gamer, I mostly just play socially with my husband as it’s one of his special interests but I’m really enjoying this game! I know people have been asking for open world Pokemon games but I find them quite overwhelming so to have a contained city environment works really well for me! We’ve already managed to sink a lot of hours into the game and I have no shame.

Tuesday I had my dance teacher training class on zoom in the morning, then I absolutely crashed for most of the afternoon before having to teach my own dance class in the evening. Wednesday was a mix of the previous two days as we went and did some errands in the morning, played Pokemon all afternoon then I had another class to teach in the early evening.

Thursday was a full crash day – one of those where I woke up at a pretty normal time, then fell asleep almost immediately on the sofa after breakfast. I resigned myself to having a computer afternoon on the sofa and did a little catch up on my to do list.

On Friday my husband and I tried to have a productive day around the house before I went to my ballet class (that I don’t teach) in the evening.

Then Saturday, my best friend from uni got married and it was such a beautiful day! The ceremony was stunning, the venue was gorgeous and I managed to make some friends too! It was so nice to dress up, eat some incredible food and have a good boogie!

And Sunday has been a very quiet day – the clocks changed so we got that sneaky extra hour of sleep, snuck in a food shop as the shops opened and have plodded through the day. My husband is hyper-focusing on a new D&D campaign that he’s designing so he had an idea for a craft project which resulted in a spontaneous Hobbycraft trip, which I’ll never say no to!

I thought the obsession with her would die down a little after we adopted her but it really hasn’t, especially as she continues to grow to trust us and cuddles more, so I’m sharing my obsession!

Why she was sniffing our shoes post-wedding I have no idea but she was shoving her nose in there!

Lucas (the husband) downloaded some sort of fish game for cats on his phone and rather than batting at them or trying to play, she just watched them and her eyes tried to follow when they went off screen! It was so unexpectedly wholesome.

Then I thought she looked someone majestic on the try with the sun shining!

Aaaaaaaand I can’t resist taking photos of her when she’s sleeping, she’s so dang cute.

A much needed quieter week for sure! I’m still feeling kind of rough and I don’t know what to do about it, but I’ll try continue to try and pick up the pieces and avoid the uncontrollable napping.

Thank you so much for reading,

Sophie xx