taking a lookback at my most anticipated releases for the year: have i read them?

I was going to compile my most anticipated releases of 2023 post…but then I realized that I probably need to do this one first to guilt myself into actually reading the books on my 2023 list. Because this will not be pretty (but it’ll be fun!) However, I never actually made a big list for 2022. So for this particular post, I could go over my monthly anticipated releases but I just recently started to really narrow those posts down. Because of that, I’ll just be referencing my quarterly roundup of anticipated books I wanted to get to for each quarter.

first of all, let’s reference my top 5 anticipated releases from january-march:

I have not yet read Only A Monster because it is never at the library branch I’m at* so yeah. I put the audiobook for The Girl Who Fell Beneath The Sea on hold but have deferred it 3 times because I’m not sure if I even want to do the audio! Audiobooks and I have a very historically complex relationship. Anyways, I did read One For All** and…it was definitely something. A Magic Steeped in Poison was a marginally better something, and All My Rage is probably my favorite book of the year. All in all, that’s 2/5 books unread, 2/5 that were disappointments, and 1/5 that blew me away.

*you could argue that i could “put it on hold” but that’s so much WORK. and then it travels all the way to my library branch and it’s not like it’s an uber driver, so i have no ability to track it! say what you want about me but i am most certainly the world’s leading expert in “bookish first world problems”

**i actually FULLY wrote this review and just…never posted it??? i think i just felt so bad lmao

next up on the chopping block: my top 5 most anticipated books for april-june!! (i actually only put two 2022 releases on this particular post so we’ll only discuss those)

This Vicious Grace took me by surprise. I expected it to be a fun (but basic) YA fantasy but holy crap the romance??? The characterization??? The magic and plot and discussion of mental health??? 100% will be on my favorites list. Go Hunt Me was supposed to be a good mystery-thriller-horror hybrid but it just could not stick the cobwebs* it needed to stick. Overall, I was 2/2!

*did i just rewatch spiderman no way home you ask? why yes, yes i did and it’s still just as heartbreaking as the first time.

summer days are breezy and we can take it easy: 5 july-september releases!

Babel was so close to getting read by me because I had a hold on it a month before it released…if only it had released earlier in August. School started and I simply could not fathom giving this story the attention it deserved. Spells For Forgetting is on my list to get to soon! I have no idea why I added Foul Lady Fortune considering I haven’t even finished Our Violent Ends yet so uh that’s definitely unread. Luckily, I did read the gothic fantasy murder-mystery-romance novel that was Belladonna* and the absolutely DEVASTATING sequel that was The Ballad of Never After. So that’s 3/5 that are unread, and 2/5 that were very much loved!

*i might talk about this in a future post but actually the romance kinda sucked. this book was so close to being nearly practically perfect but that ROMANCE–

and uh…apparently i didn’t do one of these posts for the last quarter of the year??? so uh just know i read both the atlas paradox and strike the zither which were both books i was anticipating!!!

So that’s it!!! Tell me: did you get to read some of the books you were highly anticipating in 2022??? Because there’s at least 10 not on this list that I didn’t hahaha…ha. Anyways, let me know what those are!!! And be on the lookout for my 2023 post!!!

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