My 2016 Reading Challenge Recap

Good news—I just completed my 2016 Goodreads Reaching Challenge! This year, I set myself what I thought was a rather moderate goal: to read 50 books over the course of the year. Though in my high school years I think I could have easily surpassed that number, I’d been repeatedly falling short the last two or three years of doing the challenge because college really cut into my reading time. Ironically, I read far fewer books while studying to be an English major, but that’s what happens when you spend an entire semester reading War and Peace… Now, for my first full year after graduating, I’ve been truly taking advantage of the opportunity to read whatever I want again. And of course, having a book blog to write for weekly has certainly spurred me on.

A peek at the books I've read this year for the 2016 Goodreads Reading Challenge
A peek at the books I’ve read this year for the 2016 Goodreads Reading Challenge

Continue reading My 2016 Reading Challenge Recap

Boston Teen Author Festival 2016

Last weekend, I ventured up to Boston to attend the Boston Teen Author Festival for the very first time. Young Adult literature is one of my passions, so I was excited to attend an entire book event dedicated to these authors. But what really motivated me to make the four-and-a-half hour trek was the opportunity to meet the author of the first vampire novel I ever read (and thus the author responsible for changing the course of my literary life)—Amelia Atwater-Rhodes. I was also excited to see a couple of authors that I met last summer at the Brooklyn Book Festival and to discover new authors whose books I might like.

"Create-Your-Own-Family Adventure" panel, with Amelia Atwater-Rhodes on the far left.
“Create-Your-Own-Family Adventure” panel, with Amelia Atwater-Rhodes on the far left.

Continue reading Boston Teen Author Festival 2016

Books I’m Excited for in 2016

It’s a new year, and you know what that means? New books! 2016 has just begun, and I’m already getting hyped about all of the amazing books coming out this year. Here are just of a few of the great-looking gothic reads coming out in 2016:

  1. The Raven King by Maggie Stiefvater (Set to be released April 26, 2016)

The Raven King coverI’ve been talking about this series a lot lately, especially since the first book was my favorite book I read last year. Well, I hopped on the Raven Cycle bandwagon just in time, because the fourth and final book in this series is finally coming out in April! I’m excited to see if Blue and the raven boys succeed in finding their Celtic king and to find out how exactly my favorite corvid creatures fit into this mythos. Continue reading Books I’m Excited for in 2016

New Years Blog Resolutions

Happy New Year, dear readers! 2016 will be The Gothic Library’s first full year, and I couldn’t be more excited! I’ve got some big plans for the blog this year, and there’s a lot I want to do to really improve the site. I figured I would share some of my blogging goals for the year with you, so that you can help me stick to them! Without further ado, here are some of the things I’d like to do with the blog in 2016:

Happy New Year 2016 copy Continue reading New Years Blog Resolutions