Links I Loved This Week – 12/10/2017

I can’t believe it’s only 2 weeks until Christmas and also only 13 days until I leave for my two-week vacation to see my family in Milan. I couldn’t be more excited about it because a) it’s real winter in Milan right now, with temperatures below 50 degrees (while here in LA it insists being over 80) and b) this gives me the perfect excuse to vegetate and read to my hearts content while I’m there.

What are all your plans for the Christmas vacation? I need to start selecting the books I want to read on my trip, though hopefully many of them will be in ebook version and won’t require weighing down my suitcase. In the meantime, I have about eight million more holiday parties to attend before the end of the work year. Definitely going out of 2017 with a bang!

Before we get on to this week’s links, I’m currently running a giveaway (through Wednesday December 13th) for two gorgeous snowflake-themed Book Buddles (one paperback and one hardcover sized). It’s INTERNATIONAL, so make sure to enter if you’re interested (link in this post).

• Top Ten Tuesday is a weekly meme hosted by The Broke And Bookish, and this week’s topic was a fun one: Top Ten Bookish Settings I’d Love to Visit (full list of links here). Here were some of my favorite posts: Dwell In Possibility, Novel Visits, Lindsay’s Library, A Cocoon Of Books, Lisa Loves Literature, Death By Tsundoku and Books And Munches.

• November Recaps were somewhat divided between last week and this week so I wanted to reflect a few posted this week that I really enjoyed, including on Jessicamap Reviews, Bookidote, Lindsay’s Library and Midnight Book Girl. It’s always nice to see what everyone has read and reviewed in a given month.

• It definitely was the week of posts on Bookish Gift Suggestions for the holidays (my post here) and I really enjoyed the lists on Parchment Girl, The Bookish Libra, The Bandar Blog and The Calico Books. If you need ideas for what to buy other book lovers in your life or yourself, you should be all set!

• Another theme for the week were posts on books that bloggers found overrated in 2017 – always a controversial and interesting topic. Parchment Girl’s list included Mohsin Hamid’s Exit West (I agree), while Sarah’s Book Shelves included one of my favorites, Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine (gasp!) in hers. Let the battle lines be drawn 😉

• Of course the Goodreads Choice Award winners were announced this week, and I was not surprised that most of my picks did not make it to #1, as I could tell while I was voting which title would actually win based on overall popularity. The one winner I did pick was What Happened by Hillary Clinton, which took first place in the memoir & autobiography category. You can read my review of it here.

• I really loved this post on Reading Every Night that compiled advice from many experienced book bloggers to those who are just starting out with their blog. Even as someone who has been blogging for over a year now, I found the advice really helpful and cathartic. Definitely worth a read!

• I wanted to congratulate Katie at Doing Dewey on her impressive six-year blogiversary! Definitely someone whose efforts to look up to in the book blogging world. I also wanted to highlight that she runs a Nonfiction Friday linkup every week, so if you post any nonfiction reviews, make sure to share them on her page.

• Inge at The Belgian Reviewer tested out the cutest idea for a mini Christmas tree made out of book pages. It looks relatively simple to make but comes out really cute, and would make a great bookish decoration for a small space or even a cubicle at work.

• And as always, if you’re looking for even more bookish links, The Secret Library Blog has her post up today as well!

• Here are the individual book reviews I read this week that inspired me to consider reading the books they covered:
  • American Radical by Tamer Elnoury on It’s Book Talk (nonfiction)
  • The Best Day Ever by Kaira Rouda on Jessicamap Reviews (thriller)
  • Hold Back The Stars by Katie Khan on Jo’s Book Blog (sci-fi)
  • Twice The Speed Of Dark by Lulu Allison on Bibliomaniac (contemporary fiction)
  • The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne on The Gilmore Guide To Books (historical fiction)

• On Wednesday I published an Author Spotlight of Andy Weir, including reviews of his two novels two date – The Martian and Artemis. I really loved The Martian, but, like others, found Artemis to be a bit of a sophomore slump for the author.

• On Thursday I published my annual holiday gift idea post with options for 33 Original Bookish Gifts For The Reader In Your Life – including bookish scarves, pillows, totes and more. This post included the Book Buddle giveaway of course, so make sure to enter if you haven’t already!

• For this upcoming week I’m planning on participating in the Top Ten Tuesday topic with a list of my Top Ten Books for 2017, and after that I’m planning to post a review of Isabelle Allende’s new novel In The Midst Of Winter. I’m going to combine the review with photos, note and insights from the event I went to last week at which I had the opportunity to hear her speak. If I can, I’ll squeeze one more review in there as well, since I’m starting to get a bit behind (but who isn’t).

• Is anyone else here obsessed with the idea of a tiny home? It definitely would take all sorts of financial and logistical preparation to take the plunge, so I was very intrigued by this idea of a tiny home hotel located in a ski resort in Wyoming. I particular like the idea of visiting it by myself in the spring for a weekend, to disconnect. Although that kind of sounds like the kind of plot that would make a great premise for a thriller.

• Are you as excited as I am about Season 2 of The Crown. I haven’t started it yet (though I plan to today) because I’ve been re-watching Season 1 all day yesterday to be prepared to experience Season 2 fully immersed.

• My work is having a cookie exchange tomorrow, and though I’m planning on making my usual almond raspberry thumbprints as one of my cookie options, I’ve been undecided about a second recipe. I’m considering these chocolate peppermint cookies. Any suggestions? I like drop cookies that don’t involve complex decoration.

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Any articles or blog posts from the book world that you really enjoyed this week? Share them in the comments!

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