Hello fellow bookworms 🌼 May was a weird month, especially as I have less plans than I would normally have and it kind of put me in a bad mood, especially as I’m in between studies and therefore at home so much without many exciting things happening. Given the circumstances the Cruise that we had booked was canceled so my family and me all spent about a week at home, feeling a bit sad even though we knew that going on a Cruise simply wasn’t possible for the time being. Yet I still felt sad as I was looking forward to the Cruise so much and even though we’re probably going to do it next year, things have gotten a bit complicated because I will be at a new university then and have no idea about my schedule yet. With that being said, I hope you’re all still safe and taking care of yourself 🌷💗
EDIT: Given that there are a lot of protests going on because of the murder of George Floyd and other black people by the police, I wanted to include a list of resources you can use to inform and educate yourself on what’s currently going on and can find out how to get involved as well!
- A great comprehensive list of resources on blacklivesmatter
- 10 Steps to Non-Optical Allyship
- Tips on how to help if you’re from Europe like me
- A great Thread on what you can do to help
- A great guide to anti-racist resources
- Safety Tips during Protests
- Nonfiction Book Recommendations about Black Activists
🔄 = Reread 💌 = Library Books 🌈 = Here and Queerathon
🐯 = #YARC2020 ✨= #StartOnYourShelfathon ⌛ = Digital Arc
In May I was hoping to be a bit more chill about my reading … It didn’t happen 😂 Because I currently have a lot of time on my hands I was determined to do all the Readathons and also read so many books through the digital library offer that I’m currently using – which has access to so many amazing books that I’m determine to read. I definitely need to limit how many books I check out, because even though the offer is tempting – this is the best library offer I’ve ever had so I want to make the most of it – reading with a deadline was stressing me out a bit. That being said I did read 13 books and I had a lot of fun doing all the Readathons, so next month I won’t be doing as many and instead mood-read a lot, with a focus on my owned books that I haven’t really touched recently. So basically, the goal for June is to read what I want without putting any unnecessary pressure on myself. I also still need to finish The Lies of Locke Lamora. I wanted to read it for Tome Topple but the book is a lot denser than I had anticipated and I only read about 50 pages because of that. I still think the book is interesting and Locke Lamora is exactly my kind of character, so I want to finally tackle this book in June 🙏
When it came to my Out of Comfort Zone Challenge … I kind of didn’t read as much compared to the other months 😂 I only ended up reading 2 books, though I’m happy to report that I ended up liking both of them (4-star reads!), so I’m counting that as a win! Both of them were adult books, so that’s always a great achievement for me. Saga is also a sci-fi graphic novel and Over the Top is a memoir/nonfiction book about Queer Eye’s Jonathan Van Ness 🥰 I have no idea how many books I’ll read for the challenge next month as I’m trying to be a bit more chill about my TBR, but maybe I’ll continue with the Saga graphic novels as they make for quick and fun reads.
Saga Vol 2. (Vaughan, Staples) ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 💌
Not Your Villain (C.B. Lee) ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 💌 🌈 🐯
Not Your Backup (C.B. Lee) ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 💌 🌈 🐯
Over the Top (Jonathan Van Ness) ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 💌 🌈
Once again I couldn’t resist and participated in all the Readathons in May! The month was full of amazing Readathons and it pained me that I couldn’t do them all 🥺 But I picked out two Readathons that I definitely wanted to do and that was month-long, which is always a bit more relaxed and less intense than shorter Readathons. As May was both Asian American Heritage Month and Mental Health Awareness Month, I participated in two themed Readathons: the Asian Readathon (hosted by readwithcindy, I participated in it last year as well) and the Mentalhealthathon (my first time participating) 🥰 I had a lot of fun reading for both of them and read some great books! Here is what I was reading (I included all books together as some of them overlapped). The Asian Readathon didn’t have a bingo board but here is my finished Mentalhealthathon Bingo Board!
Readathon Key
- Asian Readathon = 🐯
- Mentalhealthathon = 🌷
1. You Asked for Perfect (Lana Wood Johnson) ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐.5 💌 🌈 🌷
2. Darius the Great Is Not Okay (Adib Khorram) ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐ 💌 🌷 🐯
3. Not Your Villain (C.B. Lee) ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 💌 🌈 🐯
4. Not Your Backup (C.B. Lee) ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 💌 🌈 🐯
5. Over the Top (Jonathan Van Ness) ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 💌 🌈 🌷
6. Team Avatar Tales (Gene Luen Yang) ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 💌 🐯
7. Seven Deadly Shadows (Alameda & Maetani) ⭐⭐⭐.5 💌 🐯
8. Shadowsong (S. Jae-Jones) ⭐⭐⭐.5 💌 🌷 🐯
9. Wintergirls (Laurie Halse Anderson) ⭐⭐⭐ 💌 🌷
10. All Our Broken Pieces (L.D. Crichton) ⭐⭐ 💌 🌷
11. Saga Vol 2. (Vaughan, Staples) ⭐⭐⭐⭐ 💌 💗
12. Eight Will Fall (Sarah Harian) ⭐⭐⭐.5 💌
13. Sheets (Brenna Thummler) ⭐⭐⭐ 💌
Favorite Book 💕
🌼 Review: Vengeful by V.E. Schwab 💖 Villains, Heroes, and Victor Vale 🌼Favorite Books by Asian Authors 🌸 + #asianreadathon TBR
🌼 5 More Mental Health Recommendations 🌸 feat. #mentalhealthathon TBR 🌼 Talking about my Good Reading Habits 📗 Rereading, Review-writing, and Reading Motivation
🌼 Arc Review: Cat’s Café by Matt Tarpley ☕ Wholesome comics about animals and mental health 🌼 Getting Back to Writing #6 // Camp NaNo Wrapup and First Round of Revision Finished!! 🎉
🌼 The Flower Book Tag 🌺 Spring is here
For this section of my wrapup I’m linking up with the Favorite Blog Posts of the Month Meme that has been created by Kristin @ kristinkravesbooks to showcase our favorite blogs of the month!
-
10 Things I Want To See More of In YA Books About Mental Health (Cait @ paperfury)
- What It Takes For Me to Rate a Book 5 Stars // What I Look for in Characters, Plot & More, ft. Examples! & Guessing 2020 Book Release’s Plots Based on Nothing But Their Covers // In Which My Dreams of Becoming a Psychic Crash & Burn (Caitlin @ caitlinalthea)
- How Often Do You Complete Series? My Thoughts On Why it’s Okay to be a Serial Series Quitter. (Dani @ perspectiveofawriter)
- The Stuck at Home Book Tag! (Destiny @ howlinglibraries)
- Highest Rated Books (according to GR) I’ve Read! (Kat @ lifeandotherdisasters)
- The Percy Jackson/Heroes of Olympus Character Book Tag // In Which I’m Back, Screaming About Books (Lily @ sprinklesofdreams)
- 3 Steps To Motivating Yourself To Write // Find Happiness And Fulfillment In Your Writing Life (Madeline @ Happy When Writing)
- A Percy Jackson adaptation is coming to Disney+ and I have so many thoughts! & My bookish “nope list” (aka, things that don’t interest me in books) (Margaret @ weirdzeal)
- If you liked these YA contemporary books, you’ll love these underrated ones! & Mental Health Awareness Month: 10 YA Books with mental health representation & 10 things I want to read more of in YA books (Marie @ drizzleandhurricanebooks)
- The Percy Jackson/Heroes of Olympus Character Book Tag (Original!) (May @ foreverandeverly)
- Bookemon readathon sign-up post (Mel @ cottoncandybookwitch)
- March and April Wrap-up inc OWLs Magical Readathon 2020 (Pauliina @ bookaholicdreamer)
- My Favourite Characters in Quarantine Book Tag (Sophie @ sophiexli)
- Small ( s m o l ) Tropes I Love In Books & The Identity Crisis Book Tag | who am I, Hedwig ?? (Sophie @ meandink)
- Let’s Celebrate the Series Announcement: Percy Jackson vs Heroes of Olympus Book Tag (Tasya @ literaryhuntress)
- Percy Jackson TV Show Announcement Reaction// Discovering My Godly Parent (Tiffany @ readbytiffany)
- Announcing The 2nd Annual Summer Readathon! // 2020 Schedule + Themes & My Progress From The 24-Hour Readathon! // May 19, 2020 (Xandra @ starryskybooks)
- How I’d Gotten Into Audiobooks (Tips & Recommendations) & Book Maths: This Book + This Book = This Book & Cheated and Deceived: 5 Kinds of Plot Twists I Don’t Like & Post Ideas I’ve Scrapped (Veronika & Sabrina @ wordyandwhimsical)
I passed my Bachelor Thesis!! OMG FINALLY!!! I have been waiting for two months to hear back if I passed and finally find out my grade, so I know for sure that I can even apply to all the Master Courses that I already picked out. And then I finally got the E-Mail confirming that I have passed my Bachelor’s Degree, YES!! 🎉🎉🎉 I’m also really proud of the grade that I got and I still cannot believe that I can rest a bit easier now that I have achieved my Bachelor Degree 🥺💗 Also, everyone was so nice with their well-wishes and friends of our family baked me an amazing cake and gave me such lovely gifts, I’m so grateful 😭😭😭

I’m also still applying to multiple Master Courses. Hopefully I’ll soon have my official Bachelor Certificate to use for my applications, but for now I’m making do with my official transcript of records. I applied to some of the universities that have an early deadline already and I’m hoping for the best. My current problem is that my specific study course is different from the classical Psychology Bachelor because I had to subjects (Psychology and Sociology), which means that I’m missing some areas of Psychology that we didn’t do but are required for a Master Course. Some of the alumni of my university still got into other Master Programs (I still cannot understand that our University didn’t create a Master Program for us, they had enough time), so I hope that I have a chance of making it! 🙏
Things that made me happy 😊
- I started playing a new Nintendo Game! I just finished playing Ocarina of Time 3D, which was excellent by the way. It’s such an important game in the Zelda Timeline and was challenging yet also great to play 🥰 I always love me some Tim travel so that part was great as well! Now I started A Link Between Worlds which is perfect as it builds upon the lore established in Ocarina of Time. This game reminds me a bit more of the earlier Zelda games in terms of the gameplay but it’s really good (and you can walk on the walls like a painting which is cool) 😄
- All the Percy Jackson Hype!! In case you missed it, Percy Jackson is getting a second chance at an adaption with a Disney+ Show!! We all know that the movies didn’t do the amazing world of Percy justice so I really hope this time around we will get a worthy adaption 🙏 I’m a bit scared about that, but I’m hoping for the best, especially as Rick Riordan will be more involved this time around. Now the only question that remains is how I’ll watch the show when it comes out because I don’t have Disney+ and don’t have the money just to get it for one show 😅
- Watching Shows with my friend Sandra 💗 Once again we have been checking out great new Netflix content and I really liked what we were watching this month! Together we watched {Never Have I Ever, The Half of It and The Stranger}
In June I finally need to be more chill 🌸 I said this last month as well, but I need to get less intense about my reading, so I won’t be joining many Readathons. But as it’s Pride Month I couldn’t resist joining the Prideathon, hosted by Kav @ xreadingsolacex and Marta @ stellae thoughts! 🌈 They have a Twitter Account and I especially love the prompts that you can follow along, so I’m really excited to be joining them and reading as many books as I can, while still being a bit more relaxed about my reading 😊 Apart from that, I will continue applying to Master Courses and also doing Revision (the second round of developmental edits is coming soon, and I hope it’ll be less intense than my first round of revision), so that’s about it for my plans 😄 Oh and I’m really excited about all the upcoming posts on my blog, especially as it’s time for some Mid-Year reflection already AHHHHH!! 😱
What were you up to in May? What was your favorite book this month? Did you in any Readathons? I hope you’re staying safe 🌼
Congratulations for getting your bachelor’s degree, it’s so exciting!!! Good luck with your Master’s application, I hope you’ll get into the best program for you 🙂
Also, thank you for including my post in this wrap up ❤
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Thank you so much, Tasya!! I’ve been applying to several Master Courses for a few weeks now and hope that one of them will be the right fit 😊
Always happy to share your posts 🥰
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You’re still posting so much, it is truly awesome 🙂 I manage a post a week at best these days xD but I am perferctly happy with that pace right now.
Congratulations on your thesis! That is awesome 🙂
Any chance you play Animal Crossing? 🙂
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Thank you so much, Evelina! 😊 A post per week is great too! I always think that it’s most important to be happy with your own pace and find what works for you ❤
Thank you so much! 🎉
I sadly don’t have a Switch (and haven’t yet bought the DS games) but I have been playing lots of Pocket Camp on my phone 🥰 Are you playing as well?
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Yeah, we’ve been playing it over every breakfast with my husband 😀 hahaha
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Congratulations on passing your Bachelor Thesis! And good luck with your Masters applications! 💗☺️
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Thank you so much!! 🥰🎉
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You keep saying that you need to chill more, but you ACTUALLY need to chill more haha
I’m glad you had fun with the readathons you picked out though and I’m really happy you can rest easy with your Bachelor Degree done (although I had no doubt 😉 ) As always, thank you so much for sharing my tweet. You are a constant supporter and I appreciate you so much for that ❤
I hope June is all the things you hope for and that the Prideathon will be another great experience.
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True, I always say it but then don’t do it 😂 I’m so relieved that I finally officially passed, so now I can make my applications with the knowledge that I actually have my degree! 🎉 I’m always happy to share your posts!! 🥰❤
Thank you, I hope that you’ll be having a great June as well! 🌸
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Wow u had quite the reading month!! So many readathons 😱 congrats on getting your bachelors that’s so exciting!! Good luck with your masters as well!
That Johnathan Van Ness book looks so fun I love his show Queer eye! And Never Have I Ever is another show I want to start on Netflix ASAP it looks so good! Great wrap up 💖☺️
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Thank you, Jamie! 🥰 I loved doing so many Readathons, it definitely boosted my reading 📗 I’m also very happy to finally have passed my Bachelor’s so I can focus even more on applying for a fitting Master program 🙏
I love Queer Eye as well! I’m definitely excited for the new season coming very soon ❤ I hope you enjoy watching Never Have I Ever! Thank you! ❤
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Yay I’m glad you had a good reading month and got to join in on two readathons. I participated in the Asian one too as I really enjoyed it!! I’m glad you enjoyed Not Your Back Up as I’m currently reading it. I am so glad to hear you loved You Asked For Perfect as that book is high on my TBR!! It looks so good!
Huge congrats on passing your Bachelor’s Degree, that is amazing. You should be so proud and I’m glad you had a mini celebration. Good luck with finding your master course, I hope it all works out. It is cool that you did sociology as that was one of my favourite subjects when I did my a-levels !! 🙂
I hope you have a great June and read some good books for your prideathon !! ❤ Also thank you so, so much for sharing my posts. I'm glad you enjoyed them !! ❤
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So happy to hear that you also joined in with the Asian Readathon and had fun! It was such a great experience for me as well and I think this will be a Readathon that I join every year 🥰 Ohh, how did you like the Sidekick Squad books? I hope you end up liking You Asked for Perfect, it was such a fantastic, quick but also an emotional book!
Thank you so much!! ❤🎉🎉🎉 I’m currently applying to several Master programs in the hopes of getting accepted to one, let’s hope for the best 🙏 I didn’t plan on doing Sociology, but as I needed a second subject I choose it and it fit perfectly with Psychology 👍
Always happy to share your posts, Sophie ❤ I hope you have a great June as well!! 🌺
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It was great and that is awesome !! I think I might as well you know ! 🙂 I liked the Sidekick Squad books, it is fun and quite a quick read. My favourite parts are the superhero bits and the friendship group, I love it when they are all together. I do think the plot has some pacing issues and could be shorter in parts. But still a solid read !!
I think I will from what I’ve heard !
Aww.. I’m sure you will get accepted !! 💞 Oh right, I can see how it fits so well with Psychology !!
Thank you 💞💞 !!
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I loved the superhero aspect so much as well! And the Squad is absolutely amazing, I love all their interactions and the characters are really what made the book so great 🥰 I do agree that some of the pacing was a bit off at times.
Thank you! 🥰
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Big congrats on passing you Bachelor thesis!! ❤ ❤ I hope everything will work out with your Master’s, it’s a real pity your uni hasn’t created a Master program for you all… 😦 I really want to read Saga, though graphic novels are not really my go-to genre, i.e. I don’t ever read them, really. But I know that, like you, many people love that series even so, which makes me hopeful/excited. Also, I love your enthusiasm for readathons, I wish I had your energy. I watched The Half of It with a friend, as well, and oh my god, what a great movie!! I loved it so much. 😀 Thanks for highlighting our posts! 🙂 Hope your June will be incredible! ❤
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Thank you so much!! ❤🎉 I don’t know how they haven’t managed to create one, but I’m looking forward to exploring another university and hopefully getting accepted to a good program 🙏 I rarely read graphic novels until last year and now I read them every once in a while. I definitely plan on making my way through Saga slowly instead of binge-reading it all 😄 Thank you, I love spreading my Readathon Love 📗 The Half of It was truly fantastic!!
Always happy to share your posts! I hope you’ll be having a great June as well 🥰💗
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Congrats on turning in your Bachelor’s Thesis, Caro!! I’m so happy you enjoyed Darius the Great Is Not Okay, and that your reading game is continuing to be strong ❤ ❤ I hope things go well with your Master's, and I'm so happy that you're probably gonna have more relaxation time in June ❤ (Also, thank you so much for always linking my posts in your wrap-ups 🥺)
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Thank you so much, Caitlin! 🥰 Darius the Great Is Not Okay was truly such a fantastic read and I’m so happy that I enjoyed it! ❤ I also noticed that there’s a sequel, do you plan on reading it as well? 👀 Thank you! I’m trying my best to apply to as many Master Courses as possible to get a good selection and find the right fit 🙏 (Always 🥺💗)
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sadly, i don’t think i’m gonna read darius the great deserves better :(( the synopsis doesn’t interest me, and i’m happy with how the first book ended already. i’m really strict about sequels haha. but i may read it if the reviews interest me!
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I was unsure about reading it as well because I’m not sure how the romance will be handled … it sounds like there could be emotional cheating involved and I’m always iffy about that 😞 I’ll definitely be reading more reviews when the book comes out as well!
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Thank you so much for the link, and omg, CONGRATULATIONS!!! You’re amazing! ❤
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Thank you so much, Destiny!! 🥰🎉🎉
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Hello Caro!
CONGRATS on passing your Bachelor Thesis!! That’s great to hear that you are proud of your mark. All your hard work has paid off 🙂
I’m sad to hear about your cruise! It’s tough when things are cancelled because of the pandemic. I also had to wipe away all my travel plans this year. Hope that you will fill up the time with other fun things though 🙂
Thank you for linking my post!! Wishing you a great June!
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Thank you so much, Sophie! 🥰 I’m so happy that I finally got the good news 🎉 It’s so sad as I love to travel and was really looking forward to the cruise, but this year things aren’t quite normal. I’m sorry to hear that you also had some canceled travel plans. I hope we can both make up for them next year! 😊
I hope you have a great June as well! 🌺
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Thanks for sharing all of those resources, Caro!! I’m really happy to see so many people outside of the US speaking up for BLM right now 😊
Haha I understand the feeling of wanting to be more chill about your reading but absolutely not doing that 😂 That’s great that you had fun with your readathons, though! And that’s wonderful that you found some books to love 😀 I really need to read Darius the Great Is Not Okay, and with the recent Avatar renaissance, I’ve been wanting to read more of the comics from that universe!
Thanks so much for sharing my posts, and CONGRATS ON PASSING YOUR THESIS!!! Happy June and good luck with your reading! ❤
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I’m happy to share so many great resources that people have created and collected in the hopes that they’ll be making a difference 🙏
I always try to be chill, but then it rarely works out 😂 The Readathons were still fun though, I can never resist participating in one because there are so many great ones always happening 😄 Darius the Great Is Not Okay was truly just as good as everyone said it would be! And I’m definitely loving all the Avatar Love that I have seen on Twitter, with so many people rewatching the Series 😊
Thank you so much!! I’m so relieved that I finally have my results ❤🎉 I hope you’ll be having a great June as well!
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congratulations on passing your bachelor thesis!!! i am really happy you got some good news in the midst of all the things that are going on.
covid really ruined all the plans we could possibly have for 2020 and it’s so weird. i had so many things i was looking forward to this year and i still feel like we’re in january, even though we’re in june already. this year feels like a simulation, tbh, lol.
13 books is such a fantastic number! i loved darius the great and i’m glad you enjoyed it so much as well. i really do want to read this series by c.b. lee as it has really meaningful rep, especially not your backup for me, but i end up always prioritizing other books instead and i don’t know why! i think it’s because i told myself they’re fantasy, even though they’re only superhero stories from what i recall so it’s not even high fantasy or anything, hahah. i am weirdly intimidated by all things fantasy.
wishing you luck on the prideathon but also to keep things more chill this month, hahah. happy june!
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Thank you so much!! It was great to get some good news to cheer me up 🥰 The time has passed by really strangely and it’s hard without something to look forward too 😞 I really hope the future brings us some better news and good moments 🙏
Thank you! Darius the Great was such a fantastic book, I enjoyed reading it so much. I highly recommend the Sidekick Squad series, the books are so easy to read and definitely quick to get through. They’re set in the future and light on the fantasy 😊 I hope you have a great June as well 🌺
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AHH all the congratulations on your bachelor’s thesis, Caro, I’m so, so so so very happy for you YAY this is so exciting ❤ ❤ Wishing you all the best of luck to apply for your Masters! And as well for your revisions, I admire all of your writing work so, so much ❤
I'm so glad you had a great reading month and so happy you enjoyed both darius and you asked for perfect ahh i adore these books so very much ❤
Happy reading and have a lovely month ❤
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Thank you so much, Marie!! 🥰 I hope my applications will work out, but it might be a few more weeks/months before I know anything concrete. Ahh, thank makes me so happy to hear!! 🥺
They were both amazing books, I’m so happy that I read them! Now I definitely want to read more by these authors 😊 I hope you have a great June, as well! 🌺
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