Last week on FYFA (and in my life):
Today my husband and I are celebrating our 18-year anniversary. And since we dated for seven years before we got married (we were high school sweethearts), that means we’ve been together a quarter of a century! Pretty impressive, if I do say so myself.
This week I tried to conquer my MASSIVE email inbox and I discovered two books that I’d been given for review that I’d somehow completely lost track of. I’m really embarrassed. Lately, my email has been completely out of control, no matter how hard I try to stay on top of it. I know I need to unsubscribe from some things, but there are lots of emails I like to get—but I just can’t keep up with them all. Sigh.
I’m thinking of doing a Three Dark Crowns re-read (or read for the first time) event before One Dark Throne comes out—possibly a traveling re-read where we all put our comments in as we read and then send it on to the next person, BUT I NEED ONE OR TWO OF MY ORGANIZED BLOGGER FRIENDS TO HELP! You guys know me—I’m great with ideas (I have LOTS of them for this!!) but organizing all the little details is not my strong point. Anybody want to help? Please let me know in the comments or shoot me an email!
Here’s what you may have missed on the blog last week:
- Violet Grenade by Victoria Scott: Review, Giveaway & Scott’s Top 5 Writing Snack Attack Addictions
- The Ten Books I’ve Most Recently Added to My TBR (and Why!)
- May Wrap-Up Round-Up Giveaway – Check out everyone’s May wrap-up posts and enter to win!
- This or That Bookish Edition
Next week on FYFA:
- Roar by Cora Carmack: Review & Giveaway
- Bite-sized reviews of some of my recent reads (probably The Gauntlet, Goodbye Days, The Sun Is Also a Star and Eliza and Her Monsters)
- Let’s Discuss: Something bookish! 🙂
Latest FYFA Giveaway Winners!!:
Congrats to my three latest winners!
- Dena @ Batch of Books won The Best Kind of Magic by Crystal Cestari
- John Smith won Kill All Happies by Rachel Cohn
- Danielle Hammelef won the April Wrap-Up Round-Up Giveaway and she chose The Secret of a Heart Note by Stacey Lee
Book Blogger Birthdays and Blogoversaries:
Here are the birthdays and blogoversaries this week! I hope you’ll go wish these bloggers well on their special days! Make sure you check out the calendar to see what you might have just missed or what’s coming up. (If you want to be added to the calendar, you can always fill out the birthday/blogoversary form.)
- June 12th – Jordan @ The Heart of a Book Blogger‘s Birthday
- June 16th – booklovercircumspect4‘s Blogoversary
I made a promise to myself that I would read TWO NetGalley/Edelweiss books before I download ONE more (and then repeat that pattern). So I was good for this week and didn’t request any. I did find those two books in my email though (like I mentioned at the top of my post) and I also got one ebook freebie and I bought a novella that goes with a series I’ve loved.
For Review:
Like I said, somehow these two books got buried in my inbox. I’m making it a priority to read them! Both If I Fix You and Death’s Queen were sent to me directly by the authors.
Free:
I’ve loved Kate L. Mary’s zombie stories, and I’ve been meaning for a long time to try out her contemps. When I saw in her newsletter that The List is free right now, I had to snatch it up!
Purchased:
Twisted Mind is a novella that goes with Kate L. Mary’s Twisted Series (which is a spin-off of her Broken World Series).
Great Discussions/Goings On Around the Blogosphere:
- Kristen @ Metaphors and Moonlight asks Do You Ever Save Books for Special Occasions?
- Kathy @ My Nook Books and More tells us How Audiobooks Have Helped with Her TBR
Pre-Order Deals:
I’m now putting these in order of release date to make it easier on myself (and you, I think). Any new deals that I just added to the list this week will be denoted with a *** so you can easily find them!
- Pre-order ROAR by Cora Carmack and receive a Skyfire pendant and Stormheart Chart in a cloth bag! (ends 6/12)
- ***Pre-order WANT by Cindy Pon and receive art swag by the author and Jason Chan. (ends 6/12)
- Pre-order SAINTS AND MISFITS by S.K. Ali and receive a signed hijabulous bookmark & postcard with your name in Arabic. (INT) (ends 6/12)
- Pre-order OBSIDIO by Jay Kristoff & Amie Kaufman and you’ll be entered for a chance to have your name listed in the casualty list in the book! (ends 6/13 at NOON PACIFIC)
- Pre-order SALVAGED by Jay Crownover and receive an advance excerpt of DIGNITY and a Saints of Denver Doodle download to print at home. (ends 6/19)
- Pre-order MIDNIGHT JEWEL by Richelle Mead and receive nail decals inspired by The Glittering Court and a chance to win a basket of Richelle Mead’s favorite things. (ends 6/26)
- Pre-order ENIGMA by Tonya Kuper receive an Enigma swag pack, including a signed book plate, plus the possibility of lots of other goodies as well! (ends 6/30)
- Pre-order SECRETS OF THE TULIP SISTERS by Susan Mallery and receive a free PDF of chapter 1 with notes from the author! (ends 7/10)
- Pre-order WASTE OF SPACE by Gina Damico and receive a bookmark, a magnet, and a 4″x6″ print of Damico’s original hand-drawn sketch of the spaceship’s schematics. (ends 7/11)
- ***Pre-order THE LAST MAGICIAN by Lisa Maxwell and receive a signed bookplate, bookmark, and a temporary tattoo. (ends 7/17)
- Pre-order WARCROSS by Marie Lu and receive “Life After Legend” an exclusive short story set after the events of the Legend Series (ends 9/11)
Other Current Giveaways on FYFA:
(Besides the ones listed with this week’s posts)
- June Discussion Challenge Link-Up & Giveaway – Link up your June discussion posts and enter to win!
Even More Awesome Giveaways on Other Sites:
- FireReads is giving away three ARCs of Marieke Nijkamp’s latest, BEFORE I LET GO!
- Head over to Utopia State of Mind for the June Book of Choice Giveaway (and make sure you check out the other posts that are linked up!).
- Head over to It Starts at Midnight for the Boldly Bookish Blog Tour
- Head over to Caffeinated Book Reviewer for a chance to win An audible edition of The Garden of Small Beginnings by Abbi Waxman
- Head over to Kissin’ Blue Karen for a chance to win OBSIDIAN AND STARS by Julie Eshbaugh!
- Head over to Batch of Books for a chance to win a Captain Underpants Prize Pack
- Author L.C. Mawson is hosting the Start Reading Diverse Giveaway where you download lots of freebies of diverse reads!
- You can win an ARC of The Last Magician
- Megan over @ Book Birds is celebrating her 1st blogoversary and she’s giving you a chance to win a book from TBD to celebrate! (INT)
- Head over to Lisa Loves Literature for a chance to enter FLYLeF’s 2nd anniversary giveaway. They’re giving away a one-month subscription box to Owl Crate or $35 Amazon gift card for an international winner! (INT)
- The Bookkeeper’s Secrets is doing a year-long giveaway!
Lots of good stuff! Have any giveaways or great discussions happening on your site right now? Feel free to share them in the comments!
Happy anniversary! My email and social media stuff is also out of control, so we’re in the same boat there. It’s so hard to stay on top of everything. Have a great week and enjoy your new books!
Email just overwhelms me most of the time. Even when I get it under control, it doesn’t seem like it lasts long.
Happy Anniversary!! I am the worst with emails. I will never be good with them either. Hope you enjoy your new books. Have a great week!
Email is my nemesis sometimes. It’s crazy!
Congrats on making it 18 years. That’s incredible. Happy Anniversary. I hope you enjoy all of your new goodies.
Grace
Thanks, Grace!
Happy Anniversary! You’re only 27 years behind me (almost 28). But I still check Match.com every morning to see if my wife has registered!
Ha! Hopefully we’ll make it as far as you have!
Happy Anniversary!! Congrats!! That’s definitely a milestone!! 🙂
Nice new reads too! They’re new to me ones but I hope you enjoy them all!
Here’s my STS
Have a GREAT day!
Old Follower 🙂
Thanks so much, Jessica! I’m lucky to have found my other half early in life.
I can only imagine how easy it is to lose track of blog tours and review requests. You lead a hectic life! Happy Anniversary to you and your husband.
Have a great week!
Blog tours I’m good about because they have a specific date and I put them directly into my calendar. Review requests are harder somehow—maybe because I don’t accept all that many of them, so I haven’t developed a good system for them.
Happy Anniversary!Congrats on the 18 years! Hope you have many great years to come.
Thanks so much, Lillian!
Happy Anniversary! I’m trying really hard with my two planners to keep up from those books getting lost in email. I keep finding them every once in awhile. Have a great week!
I’m usually really good about it, but my email inbox has been so overwhelming lately!!
Happy Anniversary!!! Wow – 25 years is so amazing 🙂
Thanks, Tanya!
Happy Anniversary!!
I’m pretty good with emails, but sometimes it takes me longer to get back to things that I’d like, and I have lost some things for awhile and I feel SO bad when that happens. Sigh. It’s all good though.
I haven’t read Three Dark Crowns yet but it’s one that I really DO want to read, so I’d be happy to help plan something if you need help still.
-Lauren
Oooh! See, I’m so late in getting to everything right now that I missed this reply. I might very well take you up on this—I’m still figuring out what I’m going to do.
Happy Anniversary to you! Hope you do something great to celebrate. I try to read a book before I request another one too.
Thanks! We ended up seeing Wonder Woman—really enjoyed it!
Happy Anniversary!!
I use Unroll Me to take control of my emails… it puts all of my emails subscriptions into one email each day.
Ooooh!! I have to go check that out—that could be a lifesaver!!!
Happy anniversary!! Hope you guys have a fabulous day!
I’m pretty curious about Roar- the whole storm magic thing has me interested- and I think your Three dark Crowns re- read idea is a great one. How fun! And I can’t WAIT for ODT.
I’m excited to do a re-read because of all the comments on my spoiler-filled discussion. I’m going to read through all those comments and then re-read with them in mind. Who knows, maybe I’ll find more clues?!
I was subsribed to a whole pile of author newsletters at the start of the year but when some are contacting you two or three times a week advertising other people’s work, it got too much and I had to scale back! If only it was as easy to control the tbr…! Happy Anniversary!
Yeah, I try to only subscribe if it’s an author I really love. Even still, it can get overwhelming!
Wow, happy anniversary for yesterday. There are very few couples I know who have been together for that long so I am suitably impressed. I feel your pain about your inbox problems as well. I’m the same, I tend to get scared once my unread emails hits a certain number and have to get brave to enter and tackle the problem. I have slowly been trying to unsubscribe from stuff and it does help.
I feel like I’ll go through my inbox and get it all under control, but then it just goes back to being crazy such a short time later!
Happy anniversary, Nicole! My husband and I just celebrated our 18th wedding anniversary in May. And we, too, were together 7-8 years before we were married. (Although it was several years post-high school that we met. LOL) I’m on a constant mission to keep my email inbox under control. It’s literally something I work on daily.
Funny that our marriages have so much in common! 🙂
Happy anniversary!! And I hear ya on the email. Maybe it’s time to nuke it all and start from scratch!
I actually cleared through it all—it took me hours but I got it under control. Problem is that it takes no time at all to build back up.
Happy Anniversary! Wow a Quarter of a century! Lucky hubby 🙂 I think you are very organized! You are a busy mom and blogger so something gotta give 🙂 I’m not sure I have any tips that I haven’t heard you say you do already! s soon as I get an ARC or book to review I add it to my planner. Even if I don’t get to it when I think I would at list is listed there. Have fun!
Oh, I know I’m disorganized and I’ve given up on trying to change, really. I’m not looking for tips so much as for people who want to help out with the event I’m thinking about. I just need it to be someone organized to balance my constant state of disorganization! 🙂
Happy Anniversary! Oh my goodness, 25 years total is amazing! I hope you two were able to find some time to celebrate. ?
I’m actually good at keeping on top of my email. I have them go to the correct folders and to one of my 3 emails (blog email, book stuff/fav blogs email and personal email….I know LOL) and although sometimes it takes me a week to get to them, I’m pretty good about staying on top of it all. I usually quickly go through them when I’m blow drying my hair upside down ? or waiting on the next step while cooking.
I really need to organize my email better so that I have them going to folders. Some of them are, but it’s not a perfect system by any means. Every time I think I have it worked out, I end up overwhelmed again.