May Reading Wrap-Up

Posted June 4, 2026 by Nicky in General / 1 Comment

I know we’re a few days into June, but I didn’t want to do too many posts in one day, so I saved May’s wrap-up for now! So let’s take a look.

May in general:

It’s been a bit of a weird month for me, to be honest. I’ve been busy with work things, and having difficulty relaxing during my chilled out time. My mood was honestly terrible for a bit there, though I think I’m pulling through it now.

In good news, though, I did get back into crocheting for the first time in a long time. I’m making this beautiful bookcase blanket pattern, which uses a technique called mosaic overlay crochet. I got distracted from it a bit this week, but I’m hoping to get back to work on it this weekend. For now, the progress picture I posted last weekend is still pretty current.

As with last month, I’ve been playing a lot of casual/relatively short videogames. One I definitely have to give a shout-out to is TOEM, which is such a fun little adventure. Wandering around taking photos of everything and exploring without a map or guide reminded me of playing Pokemon as a kid. Highly recommended!

Other games I enjoyed include Minami Lane, which is a short and sweet management-type game, A Planet Full of Cats, which is a ‘hidden’ cat game with quests and a story… and Zero Stress King: Idle Defense, which is admittedly like nothing else I play, but had me pretty fascinated for a couple of days. It’s ostensibly a tower defence game, but you cannot lose, so the only thing to do is slowly build up your defences to defeat the waves of enemies.

I also mentioned my Final Fantasy XIV raid group’s progress last month, so as a quick update on that, we’ve beaten the first stage of the final boss of this ‘tier’ of boss fights, and are working on phase two (which is the end of the fight). I think we’re all eager to claim a victory and take a break at this point, so wish us luck for some serious progress in June!

Reading stats:

I know you were all waiting for me to get to this bit!

Total books read: 30
Total pages read: 5,674
Rereads: 1
ARCs: 1
Series finished/up to date: 1
Books owned pre-2026: 3
Books owned from 2026: 9
Borrowed books: 16

Fiction: 15
Non-fiction: 6
Poetry: 9
Comics, manga, manhwa, etc: 7

It’s more books in total than in April, though does include a bit more poetry, graphic novels, and two children’s books I’d got curious about. Still, I’m hoping for a bit more reading — in previous years, I always thought my reading dipped in March/April/May because of university stuff with final assignments and the lead-up to early June exams, but this year I don’t have that excuse, so maybe it’s something about spring!

Progress on reading goals:

Overall total books read: 145/400 (21 books behind)
Overall total pages read: 33,574/100,000 (8,529 pages behind)
Books read from backlog: 28/100
Books owned since 2026 and not yet started: 20/20

As you see, I’m slipping further behind on my goals, and soon it’ll be time to think about whether they’re realistic… but I’d like to see if the improvement in May was a sign of getting back into the swing of things, first. Not that there’s any shame in modifying goals, and I absolutely will if it seems right!

Blogging stats:

Views: 15.9k
Visitors: 14.9k
Likes: 421
Comments: 353
Reviews: 27
Other posts: 18

A dip from last month in stats, maybe partly because Let’s Talk Bookish took a hiatus, so I wasn’t doing those posts or doing any related visiting? And probably also because I was kind of overwhelmed, and not doing as much visiting of other blogs.

Most viewed posts:

I seem to be becoming a bit of a hotspot for danmei and light novel reviews, ahaha. I’m not complaining!

My own favourite posts:

Stuff I loved from elsewhere:

From Keira’s Bookmark: A Beginner’s Guide to the World of Ilona Andrews, by Keira
From Publishers Weekly: Why You Should Open Magical Doors, by Sarah Beth Durst
From Books, Bones & Buffy: THE GIRL WITH A THOUSAND FACES by Sunyi Dean – Review, by Tammy
From The Book Haze: Book Review | Yesteryear by Caro Claire Burke, by Haze
From The Bibliosanctum: Book Review: Steel Gods by Richard Swan, by Mogsy
From Little Frog Scribbles: Our Lady of Blades – Sebastien de Castell, by calypte
From Becky’s Book Blog: The Unicorn Hunters by Katherine Arden – ARC Review! by Becky
From Bemused & Bookish: Review of The Culting of America by Daniella Mestyanek Young, by Olivia
From The Bibliosanctum: Book Review: The Dorians by Nick Cutter, by Mogsy
From Lola’s Reviews: Review: The Fossil Door by Celia Lake, by Lola

I was diligent about saving links this month, so I had a really hard time whittling this down to a shortlist… there were several more, but I had to stop, ahaha. I don’t always want to read the books people review, but I do want to show appreciation for good reviews!

And there we go — that was May for you! Here’s hoping for a good April.