How is it already November?! With the end of the year rapidly approaching, this feels like a good time to share a general update.
I’ll be honest. Maintaining my posting schedule this year has been rough. I am admittedly terrible at writing my reviews as soon as I finish reading a book. I like to sit with books for a while and formulate my thoughts as I have a tendency to impulsively rate books five stars only to realize it’s probably not a new favorite. The opposite sometimes happens, too, and I rate too low only to realize later on that I actually did enjoy the story.
This is great for more objective reviews, but terrible when I average 12-15 books a month. It’s even worse for a serial procrastinator. All of a sudden, I end up with a backlog of 30 books to review. I’ve only managed to almost catch up once since January, only to be behind again a week or two later.
Currently, I’m 22 reviews behind. In turn, it’s been making me not want to pick up any of the four books I’m currently reading (and very much enjoying!) because I feel like I can’t add these four future reviews to the backlog that I’ve been putting off for nearly two months now. The last time I was was this behind for so long, I gave myself some grace and started only writing full length reviews for some of the books I read. That helped for a while, but reading has reached the point of becoming a chore again.
Needless to say, it’s once more time to give myself some grace.
Why have I been stressing over my self-imposed posting schedule?
Since the end of 2025, I’ve noticed a significant growth in my daily views, and while far from viral, it’s more views than I ever imagined. I started this blog for my personal enjoyment and to hopefully give myself a small platform that would allow me ARC opportunities through NetGalley. I never imagined so many indie authors would reach out to me through my contact form! This has been the greatest blessing of running this blog and is largely the reason I continue to write for it. I have been striving to feed the algorithm, and in the process, I’ve often overcommitted myself both through here and NetGalley, which is why I’ve mostly been closed to requests in recent months. Authors have trusted me with their books and it feels good that readers might be discovering their books through my reviews.
Views have dipped a bit the past couple of months despite maintaining my 2-3 post a week schedule. It’s not lost on me that this has coincided with the fact I’ve been forcing reviews out rather than writing them for the joy of reading. Looking back on my reviews from 2022, you can see how much the structure has changed. While I’m not a reviewer who often goes over books and discussing every plot point, I have been trying to strike a balance between summaries and my thoughts. Enter the other problem with having a backlog that often going back 2-3 months… I start to forget key things like spoilers, names, nuances, etc. depending on the book.
This blog is more or less my reading journal, and I’ve lost focus of that. I never set out to be a literary critic, and as I’ve been watching the traffic patterns, I’ve started psyching myself into this mindset. As someone who has had a rocky relationship with reading in the past, I am cautious about protecting this hobby for myself.
What will be changing?
For the rest of the year, I will not be following a set schedule. I still have a number of ARCs and requests that I will be reading and reviewing, and those will be posted as I finish them. I also intend to post my 2026 Top 5 (fiction and nonfiction) posts. (On time! Unlike last year’s which got posted in July! Another example of how behind I’ve been!) If all goes well, I will also review any seasonal reads come December. In that time, I hope to finally catch up on the reviews for books I read in September and October and queue them for the beginning of the year, giving myself a cushion to return to the two post a week schedule. If I can’t fight my procrastination pattern, the least I can do is work with it.
Being optimistic, I hope giving myself some time to catch up will also allow me to start incorporating some posts other than reviews and Top 5 lists. For a long time now I’ve been wanting to try my hand at page to screen comparisons and deeper dives into books. Reviewing around spoilers is sometimes a nightmare, and I’d love to discuss some books without having to omit certain plot points.
On a more personal note, another distraction from review writing has been returning to creative writing. The name of this blog likely tells you that I never set out to be a literary reviewer. This was a side quest. I’ve been going by oceanwriter for several years, my Instagram account created back in the NaNoWriMo days and when I was striving toward becoming an author. Life kind of thwarted those aspirations in recent years, but I found solace in still being able to write through reviewing. Still, I’d love to publish a book one day, and though what I’ve been writing lately will remain a passion project, it’s got me thinking about working on a book again.
This year has been a whirlwind for me. So much of me hates that I’ve failed to hold myself accountable for something that should be easy and enjoyable (but has instead looked like me staring at the blank post halfway through every sentence and taking several hours to write a 300 word review and lamenting that I have to do it all over again once it’s finished). But I’m at the point where I need to step back and accept that my priorities have been changing and that I need to change with them. While I currently don’t plan on any drastic changes after this semi-hiatus, this will be an exercise on letting go of my own rigidity.
A couple of other updates I’ll throw in just because…
I joined Pagebound at the end of last year and I’ve been fully utilizing it this year. I absolutely love this site for book discussions!
Recently, Reedsy Discovery revamped their website and reviewers had to reapply. Sadly, I am no longer a fit. Although I have been welcomed to reapply (again) with some revisions to my review style, I’ve decided that this is another reading commitment I can eliminate for myself, especially now that these reviews will entail omitting my personal opinions on and reading experiences with books. That just isn’t my reviewing style given I gravitate toward reader’s opinions over proper critiquing when considering future reads. I’m grateful for the years that I was able to review for Reedsy Discover, and it was an honor to have a few of my reviews featured.
Lastly, I feel I should acknowledge ‘officially’ that I’ve largely stepped back from social media. I know in the bookish community, BookTok and Bookstagram are vital, and I’ve definitely been feeling the repercussions of being inactive when it comes to certain ARC opportunities, but it has been a fair trade for the peace and freedom it’s brought me. I apologize to those who have waited weeks for me to respond to DMs, and I especially appreciate those allowing me continued opportunities despite my inactivity.
If you’ve made it this far, thank you! Your support means a lot. I’d especially like to thank E.B. Roshan who has been trusting me with her books since pretty much the beginning of this blog, as well as Mathias Freese. Authors like you have been my inspiration in keeping this blog up and running!
Curious about my most popular reviews lately?
The End of the Affair by Graham Greene
I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman
Becoming Madam Secretary by Stephanie Dray
Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid
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