January-July 2020 reveries: my heart needs to breathe
Yes! We’re still doing these sporadic catch up posts!
Evidently, I’m not the best at being consistent with these wrap-up posts. I mean, the last one, now that I’ve checked, was on August, LAST YEAR, which is nuts. I hadn’t realized it’d been that long, probably because I haven’t been posting too frequently.
What’s new?
As things evolve, and get better, and at the same time, somehow worse in the world, these weeks have become an opportunity to listen to hard, and sometimes downright uncomfortable truths. That is definitely something we need more of. More communication, and more willingness to listen and understand.
And, books during this time have been more of a support than a escape. Stories have given me a sense of community, which has been something I’ve appreciated so much during this time.
I’ll tell you a bit about what I’ve been up to now:
- Joined a group of ecuadorian bookstagrammers.
- Participated in a #passthebook video with said bookstagrammers.
- Discovered romance books that blew my socks off.
- Delivered my first virtual writing workshop.
- Signed up for Steezy -virtual dance classes.
- For the first time in a long time, I’ve felt like I may know what I’m doing with my instagram account.
- Had frustrating but necessary discussions about racism and transphobia with my father.
- Joined a romance book club
- Participated in a panel about Young Adult books
- Revamped one of my writing workshops so that for the first time it spans more than one session.
Books: Or, on reading what I’m in the mood for without pressure
I’ve read about 35 books so far this year, and I’m pretty happy with how that’s going. Right now I have a few books in my immediate TBR and I’m so, so excited to read them.
I did get around to reviewing a couple of books, specially during the first few months of this year. Let me tell you about them.
- Marriage for One by Ella Maise ★★★★★
- A Pack of Vows and Tears by Olivia Wildenstein ★★★½
- Cowboy for Hire (Wishing River, #2) by Victoria James ★★★
Even though I’ve discovered quite a few gems, books that have rocked my world this year, I just didn’t feel like writing a review for them here. I wouldn’t have known how to organize those thoughts in a blog post, and also, lack of time to try was a huge reason.
I will, however, leave here the ones that I consider are worth noting and you should definitely check out.
Blogging
I have clearly left my blog a little bit abandoned lately, as I’ve been trying to stay on top of a lot of other stuff. I’m still online quite a lot, but hanging out more at Instagram.
It goes hand in hand with not having been reading a lot of blogs either. Content usually comes from being exposed to other content, and that’s how a sort of online conversation starts. I haven’t been doing that, so my blogging muse is not very active at the moment.
It’s not likely I’ll go back to posting two or three times a week, but I do hope I can get back on track posting at least four times per month.
We’ll see!
And to set some things right, I’ll start by signing up for the 2020 Discussion Challenge, which I’d been doing every year since it was created, but this year I forgot to sign up in January. So I’ll do it now!
Hosted by the bloggers at Feed Your Fiction Addiction and It Starts at Midnight, for me this has become more of a blogging staple than just a challenge. This time I’m playing it safe pledging to write from 1 to 10 discussion posts as a Discussion Dabbler.
Writing
The good news is that I’m very much thinking about my story. Only, thinking isn’t writing. I know, I know. It’s a slow process for the same reason I haven’t really been active in the blog. Time.
I wish for more hours in the day.
But, at least I don’t think the project is stagnant. I’ve been working on the structure, and the dual timelines I’m going to be using for the story, which I think counts too?
I’ve been using the app Milanote to organize my writing, and it’s amazing. I really recommend it. I’ll have to make a post about how I use it soon.
Another thing that I’m very happy about is that I decided to invest in some art for my main characters, so I comissioned from a local artist who actually went to primary school with me. We grew apart, but now we’ve reconnected a bit and she’s incredibly talented. I’ve already seen the first stages of the art and they already look so good♥
Been listening to
Can’t get this song out of my head!
Looking forward to
I have quite a few projects in mind, business-wise, and I’m so excited to put the plans in place. Also, I can’t wait to read a few books that aren’t out yet, like:
- A Kingdom of Flesh and Fire, (Blood and Ash 2) by Jennifer Armentrout
- Blood & Honey, (Serpent & Dove 2) by Shelby Mahurin
- The Iron Raven, by Julie Kagawa
On that last book, The Iron Fey series is SO special to me. They were the first books I ever read in english, but unfortunately, at that time my only way of reading them was through PDFs. Just last week, I finally ordered through The Book Depository the first two books of the series in their new editions. I plan to buy them all, as they come out.
It’s a good thing that as of a few months ago TBD finally added Ecuador to their list of countries they ship to for free. With COVID and a few problems with my local postal service, I just really hope the books actually GET here. But I’m positive about this, and I just can’t wait to finally hold those books in my hands!
[divider]
Welcome back, Pamela! It’s great to hear again from you! 😀 The first half of the year was definitely tiring, my government didn’t (doesn’t) take COVID-19 seriously and now we’re kinda left to fend for our own. It’s not as worse as it is in the US, Philippines or Brazil, they do tried their best with our country’s condition but it was still disappointing. I’m really looking forward to Blood & Honey and I didn’t know Iron Fey will have another book coming out! Granted I only read the OG series and not the sequel series, but it still makes me happy to see the series is still popular now, since it has a special place in my heart too! 🙂
I’m sorry to hear that. In my particular city, things have been better, I think, but some other cities in my country aren’t doing so well 🙁
Hope things get better where you live soon♥
Yay for Blood & Honey! And to be completely honest with you, the spin off books are a biiit forgettable, even though some pretty important events take place. The Iron Raven is going to be about PUCK, so I’m very, very excited about that.
Ahh, Pamela, your blog is SO beautiful!! I loved reading this post and just in general enjoying the beautiful space here.💛🥺 Good luck with all your future goals, your writing, and reading!! xx
Olivia @ Purely Olivia recently posted this awesome thing…The Folklore Book Tag // In Which I Love Taylor Swift and Reading Way Too Much
This makes me so happy! Been working a lot on the design lately, so I really appreciate it ♥ And thank you for the lovely words. I’m feeling very positive at the moment, so that’s good! And same to you!