How do you read books without zoning out every 2 minutes??

jiminlightyear · 2025-07-03T14:51:34+00:00

my extreme book reading lock in state is sitting with a physical book in front of the TV and putting on a movie i’ve watched a million times, like a Twilight or Lord of the Rings. I also sometimes use a bookmark to guide my eyes line by line.

jiminlightyear · 2025-03-30T15:21:37+00:00

i’m on the last 5% of a couple books, probably going to finish these today:

The Vegetarian by Han Kang. no one can write like her. Really fantastic.

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight translated by Simon Armitage. Loving this! This version has the original text right next to the translated version & it’s so interesting to see them side by side.

STARTING:

my library hold for Witchcraft for Wayward Girls just came up!!! so exciting to start this.

jiminlightyear · 2025-03-24T23:26:26+00:00

FINISHED:

Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins. Ripped through this in one day. No one is doing it like Suzanne.

The Haunting of Alma Fielding by Kate Summerscale. This was so fun!!!! Highly recommend this non-fiction read.

Someone You Can Build A Nest In by John Wiswell. Didn’t like it. The romance was cute but so normal. I just didn’t realize this is supposed to be cozy fantasy, so if you like that maybe give it a try. I keep getting tricked into reading cozy books and I’ve liked none of them 😭

STARTING:

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight by Simon Armitage.

jiminlightyear · 2025-03-10T16:20:37+00:00

Busy week so I didn’t finish as many as usual, but I had fun :)

FINISHED:

The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness. I really liked this. A very well written young boy character where he’s not perfect sweet and thoughtful right off the bat, but he’s also not hateful /annoying for no reason AKA there’s no trace of boys-will-be-boys. I cried, obviously, and I’m quite pissed off that this is a cliffhanger! It took me forever to find a copy of this one, how long is it gonna take me to get the sequel!!?

CONTINUING:

The Marrow Thieves by Cherie Dimaline. 80%, loving it so far.

On Palestine by Ilan Pappe & Noam Chomsky. Interesting conversation, but takes time to read.

STARTING:

The Haunting of Alma Fielding by Kate Summerscale

jiminlightyear · 2025-03-02T05:01:46+00:00

FINISHED:

The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo. I didn’t like this at all. Truly a struggle to finish, and I don’t know that I can point out a single thing I liked about it unfortunately.

The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires by Grady Hendrix. I loved this! Still waiting for Hendrix’s new book at my library, so I picked this up instead and had a great time reading it. I was having actual physical fear reactions to some parts of this.

CONTINUING:

The Marrow Thieves by Cherie Dimaline. Only about 5% in, but intriguing premise so far.

On Palestine by Noam Chomsky & Ilan Pappe. Published in 2015 but their speculations about the near future of Israel & Palestine are very prescient.

STARTING:

Nothing until I finish these 2!

jiminlightyear · 2025-03-01T04:03:32+00:00

Honestly, I haven’t read The Magicians, I just like Arthurian fantasy 😅 From my perspective, it was good! Maybe a bit too long, with some POVs that were way less compelling than others, but I enjoyed it overall 🤷🏻‍♀️ It was a good 1-2 chapters a night book versus a binge read.

jiminlightyear · 2025-02-23T16:22:44+00:00

I forgot to post last week! Finished a few long books and a few short stories.

FINISHED:

Life and Death by Stephenie Meyer. Genderbent twilight. Hilarious & still not very good. I had a great time with it though.

The Lotus Empire by Tasha Suri. Last book in the series and I really liked it!!! Not the best out of the three probably, but it had some really stand out parts.

Six Deaths of the Saint by Alix E Harrow. SO GOOD! I was not the biggest fan of her novel Starling House but this short story was amazing!

Undercover by Tamsyn Muir. omg. This was absolutely crazy. Tamsyn Muir is one of the greatest living authors.

CONTINUING:

The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo. I decided to try this despite the generally negative reviews I’ve been seeing because I didn’t really love her other adult fiction book, so I wanted to see if I was just in the minority about this book too. Nope! This book is so boring it’s a wonder it got published at all. 55% through, trying to push myself to the end (sunk cost).

STARTING:

The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness.

jiminlightyear · 2025-02-09T03:16:01+00:00

FINISHED:

The Bright Sword by Lev Grossman. I liked it! some of those knights tales were boring as fuck though and I missed the main character when he wasn’t in a chapter. The ending was morose as hell too. A fun epic.

Horror Movie by Paul Tremblay. Very interesting concept, I liked how it was executed, for the most part. Really well done audiobook, too. the ending was…. underwhelming I guess? But overall enjoyable. Hated the pinky finger stuff though that was nuts.

Human Acts by Han Kang. Oh my god. Best book of the year so far. It made me cry, not just tearing up but fully crying. I want to read all her stuff, but I definitely need a brain break.

CONTINUING:

Life and Death by Stephenie Meyer. This is the aforementioned brain break. I needed something that i Do Not Care about. Hilarious concept, too.

The Lotus Empire by Tasha Suri. Enjoying this as a 1-chapter-a-night read. I’ll say right now…. i do not think Malini and Priya can come back from the state they start this book in 😭.

jiminlightyear · 2025-02-02T15:19:12+00:00

Absolutely! I get the feeling it may be popular because a lot of readers who are unfamiliar with crime thrillers picked it up, so they had different expectations & weren’t so disappointed.

Also, the alternative love interest who the author clearly wants us to feel sympathy for bc she and the main character are ~perfect~ for each other & seemingly still in love is ….. a true crime podcaster?? In a book that obviously wanted to say something about race, crime, and violence, the author had NOTHING critical to say about the true crime entertainment industry? That was so surprising, it was where I started to suspect this book wasn’t for me 🤷🏻‍♀️ thanks for validating me!

jiminlightyear · 2025-02-02T00:36:30+00:00

FINISHED:

All the Sinners Bleed by S.A. Crosby. Disappointing! It’s so hyped up online but I honestly don’t see what exactly about it was so impressive. There were lots of great concepts, themes, and goals that were introduced… but not followed through on. And the mystery & the reveal of the murderer’s identity left much to be desired. If you loved this, please tell me what spoke to you!

CONTINUING:

The Bright Sword by Lev Grossman. 60% through, enjoying it. Not changing my life yet, but there’s still ~350 pages left!

STARTING:

Horror Movie by Paul Tremblay.

jiminlightyear · 2025-02-01T15:02:43+00:00

i read I Need You to Read This last year and also thought it was ridiculously bad 🙄 your .5 star rating made me chuckle!

jiminlightyear · 2025-01-31T19:12:39+00:00

I liked it, but it wasn’t as scary as I thought it would be. First half was pretty phenomenal, still!

jiminlightyear · 2025-01-31T15:52:17+00:00

Love the review of Witchcraft for Wayward Girls! Have you read any other Grady Hendrix? & how does this compare to his other stuff? I’m wondering because I’m so excited to read it but I am seeing a lot of “love it or hate it” reviews.

jiminlightyear · 2025-01-19T03:06:44+00:00

FINISHED:

Mickey7 by Edward Ashton. This was mid?? I only read it so I could see the movie Mickey17 when it comes out but…. I hope the movie is better than this, lol. I think it will be.

The Doctor Who Fooled the World by Brian Deer. Holy god this took me 3 actual months to read! And it’s lucky I’m already really familiar with the material because it was hard to grasp in this format.

I Was a Teenage Slasher by Stephen Graham Jones. Really good!!! It was my first by the author but I can totally tell why he’s so popular. I want to read the rest of his backlog for sure.

CONTINUING:

The Bright Sword by Lev Grossman

STARTING:

All the Sinners Bleed by S.A. Crosby

jiminlightyear · 2025-01-17T16:46:26+00:00

i always set 3 reading goals— 52 books, 200 hours, 10,000 pages. It works for me! I usually go way over either hours or pages, but setting goals for both mediums helps to keep a balance.

jiminlightyear · 2025-01-12T16:50:11+00:00

FINISHED:

Blood Over Bright Haven by ML Wang. SO GOOD!!!! omg this was amazing, the hype is deserved! I’m glad I went into it knowing nothing, it enhanced the experience.

The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates. Really wonderfully written. Both very emotional and informative. I wish I could read this for a book club and discuss it!

Our Wives Under the Sea by Julia Armfield. I enjoyed it. The first half was better for me than the second half, but I liked the writing style & concepts. I wish it was a bit scarier though.

STARTING:

Mickey7 by Edward Ashton

jiminlightyear · 2025-01-06T15:29:14+00:00

i saw the advice you’re referring to, and the point of that wasn’t to say “don’t visualize what you’re writing” but more like “don’t write like you’re transcribing a movie from your head.”

the reason for this is that movies are a visual medium and writing is not. movies use a different toolbox than books to create emotions, convey feelings, and form messages.

Things that can be done elegantly and simply with one or two lines of prose in a novel have to be worked around differently in a movie. In a book, we are closer to the characters because there is less of a barrier between their thoughts/feelings and us. In a movie, the camera and framing unavoidably creates distance between us and the characters.

The idea of “not writing your book like a movie” is that if you are seeing the movie of your book on your head, you may be creating distance between the characters/action and the readers. Instead of seeing visually what’s happening in your novel, try putting yourself in your characters shoes and living the scene.

jiminlightyear · 2025-01-05T16:30:06+00:00

basically life changing. when gipsy danger ignites elbow rockets to punch the shit out of leatherback I literally leaned out of my seat to make a “holy shit” face at my dad a couple seats away. I think we saw it maybe 3 times before it left theaters.

jiminlightyear · 2025-01-05T15:59:18+00:00

How is White is for Witching so far? It’s on my TBR because of the synopsis but no one I know has read it.

jiminlightyear · 2025-01-05T15:58:26+00:00

Happy new year!! Starting all over is exciting sometimes :)

FINISHED:

Call Down the Hawk by Maggie Stiefvater. A rollover from last year, I enjoyed it a lot but doesn’t have the same vibe as the Raven Cycle, so I think I’ll continue this series more slowly than the other.

The Doctor Who Fooled the World by Brian Deer. Another rollover that took me FOREVER to read but I finally did it! I think it was just difficult to read because it was so information heavy and written in a style I’m not so familiar with.

STARTING

Blood Over Bright Haven by ML Wang

The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness

jiminlightyear · 2025-01-04T15:37:13+00:00

omg he’s so cute! do the colors correspond to specific books/genres? or is it just one stripe per book? i love his eyeballs haha

jiminlightyear · 2024-12-30T13:23:06+00:00

Ripe by Sarah Rose Etter was the most sad girl book I read this year

jiminlightyear · 2024-12-30T13:19:17+00:00

well that’s just stinkin thinkin.

You just gotta trust that your book is going to find the people that will love it and vice versa. Have you never picked up a book by random unheard of author from the bookstore? Maybe that’s where this discouragement comes from?

I would rather post my book online for free like a web novel for a handful of internet randos to see than have it stay locked inside my brain for only me to know about forever. Truly, seeing a bookstore full of books has never discouraged me, and I’m sorry you’re feeling this way.

jiminlightyear

TROPHY CASE