Category: Book Related Topics

 

It is kind of crazy that we have somehow reached the end of the year again. With it comes our annual mention of the best and worst books we read this year (You can see last year’s here). In addition, and in lieu of the holiday spirit, we will also be doing a giveaway as a thank you to all our readers for supporting us this year. Rules of the giveaway will be at the end of our best/worst list. Be sure to read and enter and good luck!!!

Taynement’s Best:

I struggled this year, reading wise. I didn’t read a lot of books that really tickled my fancy and I hope I have better luck next year. The best book I read this year was Trevor Noah’s “Born a Crime” but it was a back list I read later, so I didn’t think it qualified so then, my favorite book this year was Daisy Jones & The Six by Taylor Jenkins Reid. You can find my thoughts on it here. It is also being adapted to a tv series with Riley Keough as lead.

Other favorites:

• Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar by Cheryl Strayed (Review here)
• Ask Again, Yes by Mary Beth Keane (Review here)
• Notes from a Young Black Chef by Kwame Onwuachi
• The Farm by Joanne Ramos (Review here)

 

Leggy’s Best:

The best book I read this year, hands down – A Woman Is No Man by Etaf Rum and you can read my full thoughts on it here. The day I read this book, I told Tayne that it would be my best book of the year and here we are at the end of the year and nothing has knocked it off.

Other favorites:

• The Rage of Dragons by Evan Winters (This was my favorite fantasy read of the year. Full review here)
• The Flatshare by Betty O’Leary (Favorite romance of the year, full review here)
• The Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead (Full review here)

 

 

Taynement’s worst:

Absolutely terrible book. Terrible writing. Terrible retelling. This book propelled me to be serious about dropping a book if it is not doing it for me. You can find my review on it here.

Leggy’s Worst:

Hands down, the worst book I read this year was Waiting for Tom Hanks by Kerry Winfrey. I’ve never met a more annoying and delusional heroine in my entire life and I’ve read some pretty out there romance. You can read my full review here. I also gave this book one star on good reads.

GIVEAWAY

Okay so the rules are simple – Leave a comment listing your favorite and worst book of the year and interact with us on twitter (@2nightstands) or instagram (nightstands2). Whether it’s a like, retweet, comment, repost – your choice. We will announce the winner when we return next year and the winner gets to have the book of their choice purchased for them. Easy peasy!

Happy Holidays!!!

Taynement & Leggy

It’s officially Christmas season. The malls are packed, you can play Christmas music without being judged and the decorations are up. Finding gifts for the book lovers in your life can be tough, so we’re going to give you some ideas on what to get!

Subscriptions:

Everyone knows about Audible, Book of the Month and Scribd which are amazing services and you should definitely consider it but we want to introduce you to some cool literary services like

• Owl Crate – This is a subscription service for young adults and people who enjoy YA books. Not only do you get a new YA book every month but you also get really amazing bookish accessories too! It’s $29.99 per month.
• Bawdy Bookworms – This is for the romance readers in your life and the price is quite steep ($44.95 a month)! This subscription box is definitely exclusive for adults because you get one steamy romance book and a couple sexy adult surprises. If the book lover in your life only likes closed door romances then this is not the box for them but otherwise, go wild!
• My Thrill Club – This is for the thrill readers in your life. Do they enjoy thrillers, horror, mysteries? They’ll love this box! For just $18.99 a month, My Thrill Club sends you 2 books, an e book and a few extra surprises every month. This is such a great bang for your buck!

Cookbooks:

There were so many great cookbooks out this year and it’s easy to figure out which one the book lover in your life already has.

Some of our favorites this year:

• The Pioneer Woman Cooks : The New Frontier by Ree Drummond
• Cali’flour Kitchen by Amy Lacey (one of the few healthy and plant based cookbook, I didn’t find annoying!)
• Life is a Party by David Burtka (Husband of Neil Patrick Harris)
• Midnight Chicken by Ella Risbridger (This is the cookbook I’m personally getting myself this Christmas! – Leggy)

Also, you can find stocking stuffer cook books for Keto, Air Fryer and Instapot recipes online or at your nearest local bookstore! (images appear bigger than they really are, they are really bite sized)

Coffee Table Books:

I can’t wait to grow up, actually decorate my apartment and get a coffee table book for my living room. Anyway, these are our recs for the holiday!

• The Rihanna Book by Rihanna – A visual autobiography of the star’s life
• 21 Nights by Prince -(This includes the book and a CD)
• Black is Beautiful by Kwame Brathwaite
• The NASA Archives: 60 Years in Space by Andrew Chaikin and Piers Bizony

Stocking Stuffers:

All the bits and bobs you can gift the book lovers in your life!

• This Book Earrings from Etsy (Etsy is a gold mine for gifts like this, definitely check it out!)
• For the book lover in your life who just discovered the amazingness that is Harry Potter, we have the Harry Potter wand or the Harry potter chocolate wand!

• Little Women is coming to a big screen near you this December and while you get the book lover in your life tickets, you can also get them this Little Women scarf to keep warm!
• Everybody loves candles! – these literary candles are a very special touch for the holidays
• Stationery! Who doesn’t love a bit of stationery, from these literary inspired journals to pencils.

Good Old Books:

It’s hard to find someone the perfect book especially when it’s a gift. You have to find out what they enjoyed, what they didn’t and the genre they’re usually most comfortable in and then hope they don’t already have whatever book you come up with.

We have a lot of recommendations on the blog and you just have to search the genre tags to see what we thought of whatever book you’re considering. Celebrity memoirs from people they are fans of,  is always a safe bet. Also, getting them books on subject matters they’re actually interested in.

Some general book recs that are not already on our blog are:

• Movies (And Other Things) by Shea Serrano
• Game of Thrones: A Guide to Westeros and Beyond, The Complete Series by Myles McNutt
• I’ll Be There for You: The One About Friends by Kelsey Miller
• The Complete Novels of Jane Austen
• Michelle Obama: Her Essential Wisdom edited by Carol Kelly-Gangi

Giving back (Bonus):

The Stacks Podcast is currently doing a book drive that will benefit the kids of Rocketship Delta Prep in California. The students in this school come from extreme poverty and rarely ever have access to actual, hardcover or paperback books, most of their books are photocopied. This Book drive strives to provide these kids with an amazing Christmas present. They have a book list received from some of the teachers and are asking people to buy at least one book each! Also, you automatically get entered into a giveaway by participating in this book drive. You can read all about it here!

This was a fun post to curate for us and we really hope you find something your loved ones will truly enjoy. If all else fails and you can’t decide what to get, you can always fall back on a good ol’ trusted gift card, so they can get whatever they want for themselves. Happy shopping and hope you have a lovely holiday season!

 

Leggy & Taynement

 

Every time I get in a book rut, I can’t help but think that I have no one to blame but myself because I must be picking the wrong books. I took a moment to think about my book picking process was and decided to share and also see how everyone else does it. I think insight to my process can probably be gleaned from my reading habits post.

I think the fact that I go into a lot of books blind i.e not knowing a synopsis or what the book is about, probably doesn’t help my cause. Back in the day, I used to keep a running list of books that I wanted to read. This list was informed by anything. A recommendation, a TV segment, a review etc. At the time of addition, I may or may not have an idea of what the book is about but, by the time I scrolled down the list to see what was available in the library, I almost didn’t remember why I added it.

These days, I have given up on that list for two reasons. Increase in FOMO and joining Instagram. Our timeline is full of fellow book lovers and publishing houses, so I can’t miss any of the books that are currently on people’s radars and I always want in to join the conversation. The books on my list were at least a few years old and I’d just rather something newer. This is why most of my reads are current reads vs. back lists.

Since they are current reads, they are popular, so instead of adding to a list, now I go straight to my library and join the wait list and wait the endless weeks till it gets to me. Like I mentioned, if I see a book over and over on my TL and it comes with raves, I probably will get on that. See: Daisy Jones & The Six, The Farm, Ask Again Yes – all products of FOMO.

The other way I decide on picks is through my magazines. I subscribe to two magazines that come with book review and every now and then I take pictures and save them in a “Book Album”. I rarely come back to the album but coincidentally my FOMO books end up aligning with books I have added to the album.

Genre plays a big part. Most of my reading genre is fiction. If it’s historical, sci-fi or fantasy, I probably won’t touch it. I am a tad bit turned off by YA but I know there are some good ones out there. Celeb memoirs intrigue me, so I read a decent number of them.

The last method is simply, Leggy recommends to me.

I wish my methods were more exciting but for someone who doesn’t read physical books, I don’t go through the emotions of seeing a book cover (like maybe in an airport) and being intrigued or excited to pick up a book and read it. I love walking through bookstores but most of the time, I am already familiar with the covers and get more excited if its a different variation of a book cover I am familiar with.

In summary, the ways in which I pick a book are: FOMO, Instagram, Magazine Reviews and Leggy.

How do you decide on what books to read?

Taynement

Taynement

Happy New Year, everyone!! New year, new reading goals. Last year, I went rogue and was saying I had no goals and yada yada but this year in my life, I have a goal of being intentional and I am applying it to everything in my life, including my reading.

Majority of my reading is mostly newly released fiction/memoirs so this year so, I want to try and be all inclusive with stuff on my backlist. My dirty little secret is that, I have not read a lot of classics. So this year, I am going to try and include 2-3 classics and get in with the cool crew.

Going through Leggy’s books for the year, I admire how diverse a reader she is because I can acknowledge I am not (y’all I told you I am a fraudulent reader!). She is also very big on fantasy books and *say it with me* I am not. Last year, she had a goal to make me read Red Rising and she failed with that, so I might humor her and read it and add another fantasy book.

I did not change my number of books for the year and left it at 35. I anticipate audio books will be a big part of my reading this year, so I wonder if it’ll be more or less. Oh, one last thing, I joined a reading challenge to help in diversifying my reading. I don’t think I will do all of it but these are the guidelines:

a book you’ve been meaning to read
a book about a topic that fascinates you
a book in the backlist of a favorite author
a book recommended by someone with great taste
a book you chose for the cover
a book by an author who is new to you
a book in translation
a book outside your (genre) comfort zone
a book published before you were born

Leggy

I enjoy picking a number of books on goodreads every year because I think it challenges me to read more and try to make or beat my number. Last year, I picked 70 books and ended up reading 83 books. This year, I’m still going to leave it at 70. I think this is a comfortable number for me where I do not feel too much pressure but also a big enough number where I feel challenged to read more books every year.

As usual, every year I always try to have goals in mind. Last year, one of my goals was to read more female and minority writers which is a goal we as a blog collectively achieved. I read a lot of women last year and I’m super proud of that. I also finally tackled “The Count of Monte Cristo” by Alexandre Dumas which is a super readable book if anyone is looking to put it on the TBR for the year.

This year, my two big goals are:

• Read self-help books more intentionally. I don’t read a lot of self help but I do want to be intentional in the way I pick these books and then try to apply them more or at least actually take one thing away from the books that I read. The first book that I already finished this year is “Crucial Conversations” by Kerry Patterson and I hope to incorporate some of their tips into my every day discussions.
• And as always, tackle a classic. My classic this year is Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy. Last year, my second option was “War and Peace” by Tolstoy but I never got around to it but who knows? Maybe this year?

Other than that, I really hope I have a good reading year.

Happy reading year everybody!

Do you guys make reading goals? Tell us what they are in the comments!

 

Leggy&Taynement

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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It’s been a year since we started this blog and we hope you have enjoyed reading it as much as we have enjoyed writing it. It’s been a labor of love, library runs and book acquisitions this past year. Also, a learning process for us, as we try to build an audience and make a space on the internet for ourselves and our love for reading.

We want to always check in with you guys to make sure we are giving you the best we can on this blog. As this is our last post of the year, we are using this opportunity to give you guys a chance to let us know what you would like to see from us next year.

Are there any particular type of reviews you would like?

If we started a book club would you participate and how would you like us to conduct it? Via twitter? or comment sections? How often would you like to have it?

How can we make our posts more interactive? What would make you more likely to leave a comment?

How can we improve our social media presence? Is there something you’d like to see on our instagram or twitter that we are not doing now? (please follow us on instagram @nightstands2 and twitter @2nightstands and tell a friend to tell a friend)

Any personal questions you’d like to know about us? Get to know us as bloggers!

Let us know in the comments because we want this blog to be your go-to destination to express your love for books and your feedback will help us build a better community of like minded people.

Thank you!

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays! Hope you guys come back next year for a wonderful year of all things books!

P.S We were a little disappointed that no one shared their best and worst books of the year 😦 We were looking forward to seeing what everyone else thought and also adding to our TBR lists. So if you so feel inclined, it’s never too late to let us know 😀

Leggy & Taynement

Christmas is right around the corner and with Thanksgiving over, this is the perfect time to talk about Christmas gifts! Finding gifts for that friend of yours who has an obsessive reading hobby with their head always in a book, it can be tough sometimes to figure out what to get them, especially when you don’t want to keep giving them only books year after year. We’ve come up with some gift ideas that we hope makes your gift shopping a little bit easier

SUBSCRIPTIONS

Giving your friend subscriptions to literary services is one of the best gifts you can give because they can use it to get books that they actually like and eliminates you having to guess and decide for them. Our recs:

• Audible Gift Subscription
• Book of the Month 
• Scribd – Unlike Audible, Scribd lets you have unlimited books a month

COOKBOOKS

I love cookbooks (Leggy here!) and I have a ton of them that I read and do not even make a single recipe out of. I love the ones where the authors take the time to write the background of each recipe where I feel like i’m reading a book instead of just a set of instructions. I like funny and literary books from professional chefs and home cooks from all around the world, it gives me an insight into various cultures through food. Some of my favorites (and recs)for the year:

• Chrissy Teigen’s Cravings books (the first is better than the second but they’re both still very accessible to the average cook)
• Ina Garten’s “Cook Like A Pro” is super good (you can never go wrong with Ina)
• Magnolia Table by Joanna Gaines (Taynement actually got me this for my birthday!)

• From Crook to Cook: Platinum Recipes from Tha Boss Dogg’s Kitchen by Snoop Dogg

Also, there are plenty of cookbooks that are exclusively dedicated to recipes from books. How fun is that!:

• The Unofficial Harry Potter Cookbook by Dinal Bucholz
• The Jane Austen Cookbook by Maggie Black 

• The Book Lover’s Cookbook: Recipes Inspired by Celebrated Works of Literature, and the Passages That Feature Them by Shaunda Kennedy Wenger and Janet Kay Jensen

• If cocktails are more of their thing hit them up with Tequila Mockingbird: Cocktails with a Literary Twist by Tim Ferdele. Besides the fun title, it is a fun cover.

STATIONERY 

Every book lover I know loves them some stationery. Our recs:

• Beautiful journals for the beginning of the year, actual book lover’s journals that lets your loved one record their books and reviews for the year.
• Personalized pencil and book websites that’ll let you print their favorite book quotes on any item you get. There are book lover’s post it notes, note cards, note pads, calendars.

So much you can do in this category. You can’t go wrong with this! Oh and etsy is a huge gold mine for gifts like these, they are a tad bit on the expensive side but on the plus side, you’d be supporting small businesses.

COFFEE TABLE BOOKS

Coffee table book add such beautiful visual components to fascinating subjects and interests. I love coffee table books and if I were a grown up I’d have one too! There are so many insightful, educative and funny coffee table books to choose from. Our recs:

• The Barack Obama Pete Souza picture book is still one of my favorites and is a throw back.
• The Diary Of Frida Kahlo: An Intimate Self-portrait by Carlos Fuentes
• The Bucket List: 1000 Adventures Big and Small by Kath Stathers
• Buckingham Palace: The Interiors by Ashely Hicks (especially since people haven’t come down from the high of the Royal Wedding!)
• Havana: Split Seconds by Abe Kogan
• I Too Sing America: The Harlem Renaissance at 100 

JEWELRY 

Yes, we love the finer things in life too. There are so many literary inspired jewelry out there that are beautiful and so unique. Diamonds and books are forever so why not put them together? There are so many everyday accessories your loved ones wear that can be customized to show off their book nerd pride in really unique ways – bracelets, rings, necklaces, watches etc. Once again, Etsy is a gold mine for things like these. Our recs:

• This literary bracelet cuff inspired by Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice
• This beautiful Cheshire cat earring inspired by Alice in the Wonderland
• This beautiful book page bracelet with words from Outlander

HOME DECOR

This is for your friend who likes book and more books and would love to be surrounded by them at all times. Our recs:

• Some people loveeee the smell of old books and libraries and guess what? You can get people candles that smell exactly like that!
• It’s Christmas so this hymnal book wreath is the perfect early gift for book lover decorating.
• Book shaped night lights    and throw pillows with their favorite book quotes on them
• Really cool book shelves, book coasters, shot glasses and so much more!
• A whole slew of Harry Potter kitchen ware from Williams Sonoma such as HP Cookie Cutters

GOOD OL’ REGULAR BOOKS 

If you are brave and want to take a chance on getting your loved one an actual book that they’ll love, it’s good to do your homework first. Try to find out what their favorite books and genres actually are before giving them a book you think they’d enjoy. When gifting books it is very necessary to not just give books that you enjoyed but consider if this is a subject they are interested in. Our recs:

• We have so many recommendations on our blog by genres like cozy mysteries, romance novels, fantasy that you can’t go wrong as long as you do your homework.
• Celebrity memoirs by people you know they like, for example the new Michelle Obama book “Becoming” is currently the best selling book of the year, Gabrielle Union’s “We Are Going to Need More Wine” is still one of my favorite collection of essays.
• Anne Bogel’s “I’d Rather Be Reading”
• A book about their favorite TV show like Kelsey Miller’s “I’ll Be There For You – the one about Friends”.
• For the Beyonce lover in your life – Beyoncé in Formation: Remixing Black Feminism by Omise’eke Natasha Tinsley

BONUS

If you decide to give the gift of Michelle Obama’s “Becoming”, you could go all out and complete it with this journal and candle (below) that will provide inspiration for your loved one. These can be found here.

This was a fun post to curate for us and we really hope you find something your loved ones will truly enjoy. Have a lovely holiday season!

 

leggy & taynement

 

 

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Hi Guys!

The Holidays are practically around the corner and in the spirit of thanksgiving, we would like to say thank you to you guys who are kind enough to read and support us by working on a giveaway with The Luxe Candles. Made in the USA with a Nigerian entrepreneur, The Luxe Candles is a line of hand poured scented candles. Made with a blend of paraffin and soy wax it allows for a long lasting, cleaner burn and the quality fragrance oils allows for amazing fragrances.

Okay, so about the giveaway. There will be 2 winners and they will be receiving 3 candles each. 2 of them will be the scent of their own choice and the last candle will be the lime-basil-mandarin scented candle inspired by the novel, Long Shot by Kennedy Ryan.

How To Enter:

• Follow @theluxecandles on Instagram
• Follow @nightstands2 on Instagram (if you are already following that’s fine, just do the step above)
• Leave a comment on this post letting us know what book you are currently reading. Be sure to also leave the handle you used to follow on instagram, so we know who to contact if you win!
• Visit www.theluxecandles.com to pick out the scents you’d like
• The giveaway is open to everyone but you MUST have a U.S mailing address for your candles to be mailed to you.

Eazy peezy, right? The winner will be announced on Monday, November 19. Don’t forget to share and tell a friend and feel free to make purchases. Never too early for Christmas shopping! Good luck!

Earlier in the year, I told you guys how I was having reader’s misfortune in that, I was just unimpressed with the books I had been reading. My fortune changed and I have now read a few books I liked but now I have encountered the worst of the worst – Reader’s block!

There’s two months left in the year and I have no desire to read anything anymore. I am bogged down with reader’s fatigue (I could be misdiagnosing myself). On a regular schedule, I am usually reading a book and listening to an audio book. Now, every time I pick up a book, I want to drop it and read a magazine instead and when I hit play on an audio book, I’d rather be listening to music or one of my many podcasts.

I have gone through this in the past and honestly there has not been any quick fire cure to it. I just stop reading till I feel like reading again. I think the difference this time is the blog. I feel like it adds a level of guilt like I should be reading more to have more inspiration for material.

Usually when you mention a block to people, they automatically assume the cause is the current material and finding the right book will solve the issue. I know the cause of my block has been life and its interference and it is more of a mental thing especially since I actually like the book I had started when I got struck.

My Goodreads challenge number isn’t even high but as it stands I am 4 books behind – wah! That being said, the year is not over and 2 months is a long time so all hope is not lost yet! Do you ever face reader’s block? How do you get past the hump?

Taynement

 

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