May’s Moments of the Month: January // The New Year is New but Not Better, I Feel Dead, and I Struggle (a Lot)

January… was all over the place.

Like my whole life tbh???

2018 started out VERY STRONGLY. (Probably because for the first week, I had no school???) But then it quickly turned into a bad month as soon as I went back to school, and from then it’s just been up and down.

I’ve been having really weird moods lately, usually all of them relating to the “I feel dead about everything” mood. I’m at the point where I don’t get a lot of sleep, I procrastinate my homework, procrastinate everything, DO nothing, and feel kinda like “uhhh everything is pointless?”

The only thing I have strong (HAPPY!!) emotions about is talking to my friends, who are very nice usually and serve as a good distraction.

But !! I guess January did have SOME highlights? (Or this is me trying to be unrealistically optimistic.)

I read 7 books this month, and one of them was an online short story. I’M SO DISAPPOINTED IN MYSELF UGGGHH. But tbh I actually have two causes for this, instead of me wondering where all my reading motivation went, and those causes are:

1. I felt dead about everything, including reading.
2. THE CITY OF BRASS PUT ME IN A SLUMP, PUT ME TO SLEEP, AND I WANT TO PUT IT DOWN. ON THE GROUND. WHERE SOMEONE WILL STEP ON IT WITH HIGH HEELS.

(Okay just kidding, not even that horrible book deserves that.)

Looking at the star ratings as a whole for this month, the books I read weren’t that BAD? But everything felt SUPER slow because of that one particular book, and it kind of ruined everything for me.

    

    

star ratings link to reviews!!

• Dear Martin Nic Stone // Y’all, this book!!! This is SO SO important, deserves more hype, and is just as much as a must-read as THUG! I absolutely loved it, and tho it was way too short, I finished it in just one day, which I’m proud of. ★★★★☆ [4.5]
• One Sarah Crossan // Well. This (recommended) book of poetry was SO. SO. boring, and I almost fell asleep reading it multiple times. But then the ending was really heartbreaking?? And I got tears in my eyes??? Unfortunately, I’m mean and heartless so. ★★☆☆☆
• Finnikin of the Rock Melina Marchetta // Apparently this is the month of reading May’s recommended books and being disappointed?? But while this one was so BORING and CONFUSING, it wasn’t necessarily bad!! Just,,, not amazing. ★★★☆☆
• Reign the Earth S.C. Gaughen // I got this as an ARC from Julianna and I ended up LOVING IT??? I expected to give it like, three stars, but I enjoyed it so much. Characters, setting, plot were all amazing, even if there were heavy topics. ★★★★☆
• Moxie Jennifer Mathieu // Yes for feminist books!!! This book was so empowering and said everything I wanted to say about feminism. Wish it had included moe intersectionality but it at least talked about it so that’s good! ★★★★☆
• Girls Made of Snow and Glass Melissa Bashardoust // This was a beautiful story, and the writing was SO engaging. My only complaint is that it could’ve been waaay gayer?? ★★★★☆
• Seventh Day of the Seventh Moon Ken Liu // I LOVE the queer Asian rep because YES!!! but the story itself wasn’t that amazing (tho I did love the Chinese mythology!) ★★★☆☆

In addition to the books I finished, I’m currently reading The City of Brass (ew), To Kill a Mockingbird (slightly less ew but still ew), and At the Edge of the Universe (so good)!! These were all started in January.

ARCs?

GUESS WHO GOT A PHYSICAL ARC THIS MONTH!!!

Thank you SO SO much to Sourcebooks Fire for sending me Furyborn, I am super excited to read it (especially because I’ve heard there is a bisexual main character)!! It sounds AMAZING, and while I didn’t love one of this author’s books before, I’m 90% sure I’ll like this one.

favorite book of the month?

Well, of course, it’s Dear Martin!! That book was SO important and I think that everyone needs to read it, whether you are white, POC, American, or not American. It holds such a significant message, especially today, and it’s just?? amazing???

disappointment of the month?

I haven’t finished this yet, but THE CITY OF BRASS CAN CHOKE I HATE IT I HATE IT. I kind of wanted to DNF, but I kind of don’t.

Honestly?? This was one of my MOST ANTICIPATED reads, and all my friends praising it added to my high expectations. I stroked this book when I got it. I mentally five-starred it. And what does it look like right now??? I DON’T KNOW, BECAUSE I DON’T EVEN WANT TO LOOK AT IT.

favorite review?

I wrote so many reviews this month???? I mean, I still have reviews to write from SEPTEMBER (can someone please like,,, choke me actually no choke City of Brass) but at least I got a few of my January books reviewed!!

My favorite review, obviously, is my Six of Crows review. Y’all, I’m not kidding, it took me AT LEAST FIVE HOURS to finish it. But I recounted all my favorite moments & favorite quotes (and added my own commentary of course), and every time I read it, I get this feeling of contentment. Because reading my own review* makes me relive Six of Crows, and reliving that book is one of the best experiences I’ll ever have.

*This sounds incredibly self-conceited, and I will assure you, it is.

Well, first off, it was my one year-blogiversary!! I put up my new design (which I’m still kind of working on), had a Q&A (answers coming soon!) and also a feedback survey, which y’all can still take!! I can’t believe I’ve been in this community for only one year; it feels like so much longer?!

Oh and I also felt really dead about blogging (and everything in general) so that was SUPER FUN.

stats?

• 8 posts
• 4,456 views
• 855 likes
• 681 comments
• 83 WP followers + 2 email followers – 1 email follower (idk why I’m being so specific with this)
• oh and on Jan. 22 (my blogiversary), I hit a record-breaking 446 views that day??? A;FLJSLDFKJASHJK

(Since September when I took a hiatus, my stats have kind of stayed in the same area, but now it just all increased for some reason??? THANK YOOOU.)

top posts of the month?

    

favorite post of the month?

That featured image is UGLY and literally has no color whatsoever??? But I enjoyed writing this post so so much—it was super fun to look back on my reading year and wrap everything up, and also make some graphs about stats and things like that!!

I’m a nerd, basically.

posts i loved?

• Cait @ Paper Fury gave ten bookworm-related things we should leave behind in 2017 and I agree with all of them (especially the whole authors-in-reviewers’-spaces thing!!).
• Ilsa @ A Whisper of Ink talked about not feeling like blogging anymore and it hit me so hard, but it’s such a beautiful and raw and real post.
• Ju @ Blots of Ink and Words wrote a very nice year recap and we apparently met in May??? (Which is ICONIC, 10/10 @ our timing, now I’m officially hibernating until May so I can meet everyone only during my month.)
• Marie @ Drizzle and Hurricane Books talked about why she doesn’t do monthly TBRs and I 100% agree with her!! Honestly, people who make TBRs are 1) very organized and 2) committed. I am neither of those things.
• Emma @ In Search of Dragons wrote SUCH. A. GOOD. POST. about separating problematic creators from their content. I’m literally shoving everyone to go read this post, it’s such a fantastically written discussion aaahhhh!!
• Analee @ Book Snacks discussed pressure to write “quality content” in the blogging world, and I found her words to be so true? Not enough of bloggers’ posts are “real” posts—you can see that my posts are often very bookish-related and not at all personal.
• Lu @ It’s Lu Again talked about ARCs pertaining to bloggers and I SOOOO AGREEEE. I know that I definitely feel like getting ARCs makes me a more “worthy” blogger, and not getting makes me less worthy, but that’s not !! true !! at !! all !!
• May @ My 1st Chapter returned from an unplanned hiatus (good job honey).

• Okay. So this month, writing was a MESS.
• You know how I made a plan for January through April, writing-wise?
• Yeah, well. I killed that plan.
• I ended up randomly getting a new WIP idea that I have literally FALLEN IN LOVE IN. (I won’t say anything about it yet except that it’s a queer gender-flipped Peter Pan retelling, which is already too much information.)
• I’m SO SO excited to be planning this out and outlining it and writing it and !!! Already I can tell that this story will mean a lot more to me than other books I’ve written have and uGh I’m sO ExCITeD.
• But my problem is that I have the motivation, but no inspiration. So all I’m able to do is type out in a document random things that I just say to myself and make absolutely no sense. So basically all my writing ever.
• On top of that, I have the want to write poems, but no inspiration either!!! (Like I said, I was DEAD this month. DEAD.) My poems were decent at the beginning of January but then they just… got worse. (Which describes my whole life, basically.)
• Here’s the snippets of the month because I need validation:

• But I did do something that I was very anxious to do so I’m proud of myself for that!!!

• OH BOY. SO MANY LIFE THINGS.
• First off, if you haven’t heard me ranting yet, I’VE BEEN DEAD. This whole month, I WAS DEAD. And if I wasn’t dead, I was anxious and going to be dead.
• I blame school??? Like they expect me to go to school, do my homework, do extracurricular activities, AND not stress about it at all???? DID I MISS THE MEMO OR SOMETHING.
• But yeah, my main focus has been school, and then I just kept procrastinating that and not even being productive with OTHER things (like blogging, reading, writing, reviewing, etc.). Who gave myself the right to do this to myself. I take back everything I said about being independent, SOMEONE CONTROL ME.*
• I haven’t been getting much sleep (read above “procrastinating school”) which makes me tired which makes me walk around feeling dead. So I felt like so many things were pointless and I just had no motivation to do them.
• At the end of the month, I stopped being dead when my anxiety got really bad, over something stupid, and I had a brief panic attack. So, uh, THAT WAS FUN!
• (And thank you to everyone’s support over that, you all are so amazing and kind, and your words mean so much to me.)
• Okay wow I thought I had a lot more life things but apparently it was just me being dead all month???

*But the question is, who can control me.

READING

• read at least 7 books ✓ (I’m surprised that January-1-me knew that I’d only be able to read this much? like during the month I was like I CAN READ 9 BOOKS, but apparently, nope)
• write & upload at least 5 reviews ✓ (I’M SO PROUD OF MYSELF!! I wrote & uploaded seven reviews to Goodreads this month, and tho I still have lots to write, I can’t believe I actually managed to do this)
• keep track of reading stats in a spreadsheet ✓ (this is so much fun I just want to keep adding books to the spreadsheet even tho I haven’t read them???)

WRITING

• come up with an actual plot for Glittered Ghosts ㄨ (HAHAHHAHAH YEAH BYE GLITTERED GHOSTS SEE YOU NEVER)
• write more poetry ㄨ (uhhhhh. no)
• do a little… something ✓ㄨ (so I talked about a “reveal about writing” and I only ended up revealing it to a few friends and not everyone here because even then with my friends I was anxious sooooo)

BLOGGING

• reach 1,150 followers?? ✓ (THANK YOU SO MUCH I’M SO SURPRISED I REACHED THIS!!)
• implement my new blog design!! ✓ (y’all it’s so pretty I love it)
• CELEBRATE MY ONE-YEAR BLOGIVERSARY ✓ (so this was not a real goal… but I sTILL DID IT)

LIFE

• drink 1 water bottle each day ✓ (I think I drank a decent amount of water each day so I’m checking this, for the FIRST TIME EVER)
• straighten back at least 1 time a day ✓ (there were days I did, and days I didn’t, but I’m checking it because I like validation)
• get 9 hours of sleep at least once a week ㄨ (hahahhahahaha)

READING

• read at least 9 books (okay I don’t think I’ve read this many books since like,,, September?? and I REALLY WANT TO READ LOTS OF BOOKS UGH)
• write & upload at least 5 reviews (this should probably be a higher number but I procrastinate)
• enjoy myself more? (this month was a very dead month concerning everything, but especially reading. I’ve been slump-ish for so many months and I jUST WANT TO LOVE READING)

WRITING

• plot my WIP & maybe start outlining it? (I am so so so excited to start writing this but first I have to think of a good plot… I might be here a while)
• write more poetry (I really want to achieve this goal this time!!)
• write 4K short story for writing contest (I really suck at short stories I’m going to Die)

BLOGGING

• reach 1,200 followers (I don’t know how much I’ll be posting this month so getting 40 followers seems like a reasonable amount to aim for I think?)
• finalize other design elements (I have to make a mini divider thing but it should be really simple, but that’s all I can think of?)
• COMMENT & REPLY TO COMMENTS ON TIME (I procrastinated SO BAD in January about posts and comments, and now I have 324205854 posts AND comments to catch up on fjsldfjlsdjfds)

LIFE

I’m not even doing commentary for these goals anymore you know what they are

• drink 1 water bottle each day
• straighten back at least 1 time a day
• get 9 hours of sleep at least once a week

Dance dance dance! My team’s spring show is coming up in March, and these last few Saturdays are our last few rehearsals before it! So we’re really starting to clean everything and go “full out”. Which also means that as soon as I wake up on Sunday mornings, my whole body CRIES OUT IN PAIN.

Too much school. Honestly, I can’t think of any big events that are happening this month?? Only SCHOOL SCHOOL SCHOOL. I’m already overwhelmed and it’s only been like three weeks into the new semester.

Lots of writing (I hope?). I REALLY want to brainstorm more ideas for my WIP and also possibly start outlining it this month, because I want to have it ready to write for April (Camp NaNo). Also! I want to write more poems, and I also want to enter a writing contest* where I have to write a 4K short story. SO. Lots of writing!!

*Yes, there is a cash prize. No, that is not the only reason I am entering. Yes, the other reason is that I liKE TO WIN.

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so how was YOUR january? were you more alive than i was? (probably) how’s your reading going so far? any exciting new WIP ideas? tell me all about your january!!! and make sure to take care of yourselves!! 💕