Hi everybody, and welcome to my August wrap up!

As some of you may already know from my social media, this month is a little special because WE GOT A PUPPY! It means I didn’t get quite so much reading or TV in as I usually would, but it’s okay because PUPPY! That said, I’ll get back to the puppy below and get more into what I actually did read, watch and listen to this month first 🙂

The Bookish Life of Nina Hill by Abbi Waxman

I first heard about this book through Suzanne at The Bookish Libra’s review and I immediately knew I had to read it. I mean, a main character who’s very bookish, introverted, anxious, addicted to organisation and her planner, loves playing trivia and talking to her cat, Phil? Be still my beating heart. I loved that Nina was such a relatable character and I loved her journey of discovering she’s not really an only child but actually has a huge family who are all dying to meet her. Nina’s socially awkward shenanigans and internal monologues were both hilarious and extremely relatable.

Rating: 4 stars

A Curse So Dark and Lonely by Brigid Kemmerer

Okay, let me first say that this is by far THE BEST Beauty and the Beast retelling I ever read (that’s right, move over ACOTAR. Not you ACOMAF, I still love you, but you’re not really a BatB retelling anyway…). Anyway, this book is an amazing and fresh take on the tale as old as time that mixes up urban and epic fantasy, has a bad-ass disabled heroine, a swoon-worthy “beast” and a villain you’ll love to hate. BUT. BUUUT. For some reason I thought this was a standalone. And now it turns out it’s not and I have to wait until January for the sequel? NO FAIR! I feel so betrayed. But also really, very, extremely excited to get to this sequel!

Rating: 5 stars

Books that were DNF’ed or put on hold

Also, I just want to say that this reading month has been slow, not only because of puppy, but also because I started and stopped a few books. One was Infernal Magic by C.N. Crawford, which I started but just really couldn’t get into and DNF’ed. And another was The Priory of the Orange Tree by Samantha Shannon, which I had to put on hold for a bit. Not because I didn’t like it, but because I got the audiobook and for some reason I had trouble understanding the narrator. I mostly listen in my car, through my phone’s speakers because I don’t have a fancy bluetooth car-phone audio system thingy yet. And often this means I can’t hear very well, when it’s raining or a more rocky road for example. Yet usually this doesn’t give me too much trouble. But for Priory, it did. I got a few chapters in but it took me forever to listen to because I had to stop and rewind constantly. So no fun. I still want to listen to it, but it’ll take so much longer if I don’t listen when in the car and I don’t want to lose momentum by only listening half an hour a week or something. Maybe I’ll just buy the physical book instead. Stay tuned 🙂

TOP TEN TUESDAY

• 6 August 2019: My Thoughts On A Few Book Cover Redesigns
• 13 August 2019: Book Characters I’d Love To Be Besties With
• 20 August 2019: Bookish Trope Face-Off
• 27 August 2019: Books I Already Own on Audio or E-Book, But Also Really Want A Physical Copy Of So They Can Look Pretty On My Book Shelves

CALENDAR GIRLS

Calendar Girls August 2019: Book Lover’s Day – Favorite Book You’ve Read This Year

TAG Thursday

Stranger Things 3 Book Tag

August was still a mix of k-pop and non k-pop, though mostly k-pop. All so very good though!

Sleeping With Sirens – Agree To Disagree

Aww man, Sleeping With Sirens really is back!! I already loved their first single from the new album, Leave It All Behind, but their new song, Agree To Disagree is such a powerhouse as well! I love their new, heavier sound and I can’t wait for the release of their full album.

The Rose – Red

MY OFFICIAL SUMMER ANTHEM AND AUGUST FAVORITE! I love this song so much, from the very first listen I was hooked. It just gives me such good summer vibes and makes me feel happy no matter what.

Woosung – Face

I was really late to discover that Woosung, the lead singer of The Rose, had a solo album out in July, but now that I did, I AM IN LOVE. Face is such a fun, sexy song, and I love that the music video is so diverse and inclusive.

Itzy – Icy

Itzy and I have a weird relationship, in that I never like their songs at first, but after a few listens I find myself singing along and a few listens after that I’m in love. I hated Icy at first – I thought it was chaotic and messy. But now I go around singing ‘They keep talking, I keep walking’ all day long. Self-confidence queens.

Seventeen – Hit

I was also slow to warm up to the new Seventeen comeback, but honestly once I saw the performance I was hooked because that choreography is to die for. Wow. Also, you can’t not dance to this song.

The 100 Season 6

I finally watched the latest season of The 100! I love this show, but for some reason I was hesitant about starting this latest season. So much has changed and I didn’t know if it was still the same show I loved. But once I started the new season, I was hooked. I still feel nostalgic for those first seasons and I miss certain characters like Jasper, Monty and Lincoln so very much. I also am not happy with how they keep treating Raven and am a little annoyed to have seen some more characters go this season, BUT I AM STILL HOOKED and eagerly anticipating the next and final season. I hope it’ll be a satisfying ending to one of my favorite series.

My First First Love season 2

It doesn’t often happen that a kdrama gets a second season, but with the 8-episode seasons of My First First Love (as well as the fact that I binged both seasons after each other), it still feels like one season so it’s difficult to review just this second season.   Please don’t read on if you don’t want SPOILERS.
Overall, I highly recommend this drama. It’s a fun coming-of-age drama about friendship and family that has a lovely friends-to-lovers romance and I need more of that. Fun fact though: I loved that the changing of hairstyles basically foreshadowed the change in love interest *oops*

And now the moment you’ve all been waiting for or just scrolled on right to here, haha 🙂

Things that made me happy this month:

• Puppy! I mentioned a few times that we were looking to get a puppy, and on August 11th we finally got to take our pup home. Her name is Pixel and she’s settling in nicely. She loves doing tricks and is super energetic and playful. It’s definitely been an intense few weeks so far, even though we took a week off to get her settled in and start her training, it has been really tiring and feels like everything was all puppy all the time. But one look at that adorable little face and I don’t mind one single minute <3
   
   
• Planner. It feels so lame after all this puppy talk, but I got a new planner and I’m in love. I tried bullet journaling for a few months, but it was too time-intensive for me and made me frustrated because I didn’t feel creative enough for it. But now I got a Mascha planner and it has a ton of flexibility as well, but takes a lot less time. I can combine all my events, to-do’s and blogging stuff in one planner and it has cute little stickers so I can still feel somewhat creative. I set it up this month for the rest of the year and I immediately felt much calmer in my head.
• Friend dates. Had a few friend dates this month and ah I love them so much. That is all.
• A successful surprise birthday party. I mentioned this briefly a few wrap-ups ago, but I was planning a surprise birthday party for my dad and this month it finally happened. Everything went great and he was really surprised (didn’t see it coming at all) and happy so that made me happy 🙂

THINGS I’M LOOKING FORWARD TO NEXT MONTH:

• Serpent and Dove by Shelby Mahurin releases! I’ve been looking forward to this witch/witch hunter enemies-to-lovers for ages.
  
• Taming Demons for Beginners by Annette Marie releases! I mean, more Annette Marie, why would I not be excited like whoa??
• Fall? We had a few days of fall weather and I was so mentally ready for fall again but now summer’s back because the weather is hot, hot, hot. Though I’m happy we still got some nice weather in this year, I’m also secretly (not so secretly) looking forward to fall.

HOW WAS YOUR August? WHAT DID YOU READ? WHAT DID YOU LISTEN TO AND WHAT DID YOU WATCH? WHAT ARE YOUR PLANS FOR September?