May 15, 2018 – Sincerely Karen Jo

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Hello fellow booklovers! I hope you’re all having a wonderful week. I’ve been behind on a lot of blogging posts and I have so many just sitting in my draft. I work on them a little by little every day in between work, breaks, or whenever I can. Once in a while, I’ll stumble on really quick prompts on an easy slow day and I usually do those right away. As for the others, well… I’ve managed to edit, review, and almost finish a few of them, but this is the first one I actually completed.

Today, I’m sharing my 3rd nominee for the Liebster Award. A Million Thank You Hug goes out to my friend Bree over at In Love & Words for nominating me. Sorry it took me ages to do this (about 4 months), but here I am! Be sure to check out her amazing blog and give her a follow!!

~ Thank the blogger who nominated you and provide a link to their post.
~ Answer the 11 questions they asked you.
~ Come up with your own set of questions.
~ Tag your chosen 11 bloggers and don’t forget to tell them as well!

Why did you decide to start blogging? I started blogging because I wanted to share my love of reading, rave about my favorite books, and of course, met amazing bloggers like you!

What are your Top 5 favorite romance novels. I don’t think I can pick just 5. Romance is my favorite and I really love books with romance in them. So… I’m going to choose 5 that are Contemporary Romance only… cause if you include sci-fi, fantasy, and paranormal, then that would just be way too difficult!

The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks, Hopeless by Colleen Hoover, Wait for You by Jennifer L. Armentrout, Recovered by Jay Crownover, and To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before by Jenny Han (I still haven’t read the last book…)

Who are 3 of your insta-buy authors? Marie Lu, Tahereh Mafi and Marissa Meyer.

What type of blog posts do you like to read the most? I like reading reviews, book/blog tags, book awards posts, and get to know me type of posts.

What type of blog posts do you like to write the most? Same as above. I like writing book reviews and doing tags/awards posts even if it does take me a while sometimes cause they’re really fun.

What is the last book you purchased and why? The last book I purchased (as I’m doing this post), is The Way You Make Me Feel by Maurene Goo. I went to Yallwest two weeks ago and she was there. I wanted to see her again and get my book signed so I bought it at the festival.

What was your favorite blog post that YOU’VE written in 2017? I don’t think I really have a favorite blog post. I guess if I were to pick one, I would have to go with my TTT – Top Ten Favorite Books I Read in 2017.

What do you do for a living? I work for a Property Management Company as an Executive Assistant to the Director of Operations. It’s not the funnest job, but it has its perks — like the down time I get when I finish all my work and I can just chill and read.

Approximately how many books do you read in a week? I think 2 and at most 3. If I didn’t have to work, I definitely think I could read more.

Do you write reviews for every book you read? If not, what determines whether you write a review or not? Ever since I started blogging, yes. I may be a little behind sometimes, but I eventually will post a full review on my blog and Goodreads.

What is your dream job? Well, I’ve had many dream jobs while growing up. I remember wanting to be a teacher, a peditrician, and fashion designer. At this moment, my dream job would probably be to own a new business and be my own boss. I did used to own a small business, Sincerely Polish. I used to make handmade nailpolishes and it was pretty successful. I don’t really know exactly what kind of business at the moment, but something where I can be creative and also allows me to have a lot of reading time. If I can get paid just reading and reviewing… well I’d hop on that in a heartbeat. But, realistically, bills need to be paid.

(Be sure to check them out!)

My apologies if I’ve tagged you before. I’m kind of pressed for time these days so I didn’t go back to my other posts to check… Anyway, all of you are truly awesome and lovely and totally deserve this award!!!

Name a few of your favorite blogs/bloggers so I can give them a follow.

List 3 interesting facts about yourself.

Which 5 foods do you wish were banished from the Earth?

Who’s your favorite cartoon character?

If your life was made into a movie, who would play you? Why?

If you were stranded on an island, what 5 things would you wish for?

What is you favorite genre to read and why?

If you could be one of your favorite book characters for a day, who would you choose and why?

What is your favorite dessert of all time?

Name 3 books you’ve read in 2018 that you absolutely loved and would recommend to everyone you meet.

For each of the 3 books you mentioned, use 2-3 GIFS to describe the book.

Hope you enjoyed reading this post. And for everyone else, please feel free to answer any or all of these questions. Be sure to tag me in your posts or leave a comment here with your link so I can check them out. Looking forward to reading your answers!

Until next time!

sincerelykarenjoendsign

toptentuesday

Hello lovely bookish friends! Time for another fun Top Ten Tuesday post!!!

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and has been moved to That Artsy Reader Girl since January 16, 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

This week’s topic is Books I Disliked/Hated but Am Really Glad I Read (maybe for bragging rights…) I had a really difficult time with this topic. I had to go through my Goodreads and go over all the books I’ve read and really think about them. Surprisingly, I was able to come up with 6 books. They’re a mix of books from my high school required reading and books I don’t necessarily hate, but I didn’t like them as much as I thought I would.

So, without further ado, here are the Books I Didn’t Really Enjoy, But Am Really Glad I Finished Reading.

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Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad – I didn’t enjoy reading this in high school. It just did not sit well with me and I felt so uneasy throughout the entire time. I just thought that the narrative was a bit disturbing and not my cup of tea. But, it’s a classic and required for class so yay me for actually finishing it and not buying the cliffnotes version.

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Just Another Girl by Elizabeth Eulberg – I actually had this book on another TTT. So, basically I didn’t like this book that much because the characters just really annoyed me. One of the MC’s POV, Hope, was incredibly exhausting that I thought about DNFing the book. I almost did a few times, but the other MC’s POV, Parker, was a little better and had more depth so I liked that. Overall, this book wasn’t amazing, but also not completely horrible… so yeah I guess I’m a bit glad that I finished it. I really don’t like giving up on books.

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The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain – I don’t really get a long with classsics, but there are several that I enjoyed and loved. This book wasn’t one of those. I don’t know what it is about Huckleberry Finn, but I DID NOT LIKE this at all. I dreaded having to read it and I just could not get into the story. It was just soooo BORING to me. I’ve never read it again and I did not finish any other Mark Twain book. At least I actually made it through this one…even if I disliked every moment.

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The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan – Here’s another classic that I could not get into. I just didn’t like the story and couldn’t really connect with the characters. I’m still kind of glad I read it since I enjoyed learning a bit about the Chinese culture (I’m 1/4 Chinese).

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Cruel Beauty by Rosamund Hodge – I love fairytale retellings and I was so excited for this book, but it wasn’t what I expected. Not a bad thing, but also not so great. I was a bit confused on some parts and I didn’t like it as much as I thought I would. Overall, it was okay… I don’t think I dislike this book, but I was frustrated with so many things. And the writing wasn’t that amazing either. That being said, I’m happy I actually finished it cause it was pretty unique and interesting. I 100% would never read this book again and really want to give away my copy to someone who might actually like/love this book, but that darn cover is just too gorgeous.

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Odd and True by Cat Winters – I just did a review for this book HERE, so if you’ve read that, then you know why I didn’t like this book that much. Odd and True was just not for me AT ALL. The premise was interesting and there were a few enjoyable parts, but it just didn’t hold my interest. As I mentioned in my review, I read this probably 3-4 times before I actually finished the entire book. BUT, the good thing here is I didn’t DNF!!! Took me a few times, but I got to the end!

Well that’s the end of my list. What are some books you didn’t really like, but are happy you actually finished reading them? Leave your links in the comments so I can check out your post.

As always, have a wonderful day!

sincerelykarenjoendsign