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Happy new year, everyone! I hope you had a wonderful holiday season and a great start to your new year.🎇 And with a new year comes the opportunity to read some more books! Here are my recommendations for your January reading.

My favorite nonfiction book of 2023 was Four Thousand Weeks by Oliver Burkeman. ⌚ This book makes a great argument to strategically underachieve, such as answering less emails and prioritizing what's more critical to you. With a finite life, we can't do everything, a truth I still struggle to accept, and I love how this book challenged my perspective. As we enter into the new year, I hope this book will introduce you to a new framework and approach to productivity!

Get It Done by Ayelet Fishbach is a book that I actually haven't read BUT a friend of mine had picked it up and showed me a few snippets and I liked the tone of it quite a bit. The book is by a behavioral economist and breaks down motivation and goal-setting. The author cites quite a number of studies and goes pretty heavy on the theory. If you're looking to really dive into goal-setting, this would be a great place to start! 🎯

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern is a book that I've found to be rather divisive. Some people love it and some people hate it. It's a great book if you are here for vibes and aesthetic, but it’s not so great, if you want a comprehensive magic system or a solid plot. It features a magical traveling circus 🎪 and a enemies-to-lovers/insta-love-ish romance. The book was written back in 2011, but still is a fun read! I think it really suits the wintry and dreamy-feel of the holiday season.

For this next year, I've decided to not set a higher reading goal, but instead to read all of the books I own that I have not yet read. There's several books that I've owned for years that I have yet to actually delve into, such as Bloodborne by Tracy Deonn, the latest Brandon Sanderson books, and The Anthropocene Reviewed by John Greene. So for the next year, I hope to complete reading my book collection. And this way, once I finish them all, I can justify getting more books, mwahaha. 😈

Wishing you a year of great books and cozy vibes,

Jenna

"This life, with all of its flaws and inescapable vulnerabilities, its extreme brevity, and our limited influence over how it unfolds is the only one we'll get a shot at."

- Oliver Burkeman, Four Thousand Weeks

Looking for more recommendations? Check out last month's newsletter: December Recommendations.

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Welcome to the end of 2023! This year has flown by and I still have so many more books I want to read. I can’t wait for my holiday time off so I can curl up on the couch with a warm drink ☕ and some good reads. If you're looking for a few wintry stories to curl up with this month, read on for my recommendations!

To kick off this list, I'm going to start with Winterhouse by Ben Guterson. It's a middle grade book that perfectly encapsulates the essence of the winter season. The story features a young orphan named Elizabeth who stays at a hotel and discovers a mysterious curse haunting the owners. If you liked watching clever kids save the day, like in the Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart, or an eccentric whimsical feel, like the one found in A Series of Unfortunate Events by Lemony Snicket, this would be a great read for you! I really enjoyed the word puzzles scattered through this book and was quite charmed by Elizabeth's love of lists. 📝

If you're looking for a mystery that is not-so-cozy, The Silent Patient by Alex Michaelides is a fast-paced fictional thriller exploring the mystery of why Alicia, a famous painter, violently murdered her husband. This book won the Goodreads award for Best Mystery & Thriller in 2019 and has a 4.18 rating on Goodreads, but I found that it's a rather divisive book. Some people love the "twist" in this book and some people hate it. Regardless, I think it's a very interesting read and a great book to get lost in this December, especially with the recurring symbol of snow ❄ and atmospheric feel of loneliness and angst!

And for those you are feeling rather lonely this holiday season, a good self-help and pop psychology book to check out is Platonic by Marisa Franco. This book talks about the science of making and keeping friendships which has been interesting as I've entered adulthood. The challenges of friendship are different from the difficulties I faced as a kid. When I was young, I wanted more and more autonomy around when and where I can see my friends, but as an adult (especially as one that works remotely), I miss the shared activities where I regularly saw others and now have to take more initiative in seeking out those opportunities. I think this book will leave you feeling encouraged and inspired to make new friendships and grow the ones you already have. 🤝

Last month, I took my Kindle abroad with me while I traveled in South Korea and it was SO CONVENIENT. It was easy to carry around and allowed me to read on the plane, in the metro, and in all of the various cafes we visited. It also was very light compared to bringing around a ton of books, so my luggage was very happy! However, since my Kindle doesn’t have a backlight, I was stuck using a very bright and obnoxious booklight on dark places like the airplane. (Unlike my husband with his new fancy Kobo… 🙄)

In addition to reading, we also visited a few bookish places, including the Starfield Library in COEX Mall, the Bosu Dong Book Street in Busan, and the book staircase in Gamcheon Cultural Village!

In 2022, I read 93 books and was so painfully close to my goal of 100 books, so this year, I set out to prioritize and be more intentional about reading more.

I’m excited to announce that I finally hit (and have since surpassed!) my reading goal of 100 books! I'm over the moon about completing this challenge, especially since I had initially set it as a joke.

To motivate myself to read more this past year, I joined several book clubs and also started this newsletter! A special shoutout to Silent Book Club at That’s Novel Books which forced me to just sit and read in silence once a month. I recommend checking to see if there’s any silent book clubs near you if you like reading with others around! 😊 Without people to share books with, I think reading would feel rather empty, so thank you to all those who read with me and who also follow Lil Ube Reads!

I look forward to sharing more seasonal recommendations and bookish updates in the new year and wish you a fantastic December! ✨

Stay cozy whether you're near or far from home,

Jenna

“Our friends advertise the kaleidoscope of ways we can live. They expose us to new ways of being in the world, showing us another life is possible.”

― Marisa G. Franco, Platonic: How the Science of Attachment Can Help You Make—and Keep—Friends

Read these books before? Got any other recommendations? I’d love to hear your thoughts! 💖

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New month, new newsletter! With the extra hour from daylight savings ending this weekend, I hope you get some extra time to read and relax! This week is still looking still fairly warm, so I'm excited to spend the afternoons reading out in the sun to get my last taste of the warm weather before winter fully arrives. Read on for my November recs, themed around connectedness, coffee, and rest!

My first pick is The Reading List by Sara Nisha Adams. It's a book about books 📚 and explores grief and connectedness. Written by an AAPI author, the story follows the path of a list of book recommendations (whoa, meta) that makes its way to several different members of a London suburb. I loved seeing how the different recommendations influenced the characters and helped them cope with their day-to-day burdens. The fall-colored cover and themes makes this book a perfect read for the cold weather as we prepare to gather with our loved ones! I would love to call this book cozy, but this book left me sobbing (note: I'm an easy crier), so I'd recommend checking out the trigger warnings to see what heavier topics are covered in the book.

One of my favorite past times is to visit local cafes. In fact, that's currently where I'm writing up this post! I couldn't imagine a world without coffee or coffee shops, but Travis Baldree decided to write about one in his book Legends & Lattes. The book follows an retired adventurer who decides that she's had enough of traveling the world and decides to settle in a small town and open her own coffee shop. ☕ This book is a perfect representation of the cozy fantasy genre and is highly recommended for those who are looking for a D&D-like slice-of-life! On November 7, the prequel, Bookshops & Bonedust, will be released, just in time for my birthday! Is that a sign that this series was meant for me? Absolutely.

Today's final recommendation is inspired by the many, many friends and family who are experiencing burnout and exhaustion. Written to emphasize the importance of rest and its role in resisting oppression, Rest is Resistance by Tricia Hersey is a rather refreshing read. When I first sat down with the book, I found myself ironically resisting it. How could I think about rest when I was working overtime every week? This past month off from work was the perfect time to read this book and reflect on my relationship with capitalism, productivity, and self-worth. I really appreciated the lens of social justice that Hersey provides her readers and am inspired to delve deeper into the intersection of work and race. As the holiday season comes around, I hope we all get a little more time to rest.

In last month’s issue, I mentioned that I was trying to reduce my books in-progress, well, I’m happy to announce that I’ve gone from seven books in-progress to… EIGHT! How can I continuously continue to pick up books? Who knows, but I suppose all I can do is keep on reading. This month, I’ll be traveling to South Korea and am looking forward to finding some fun spots to read as we travel! Stay tuned for next month’s newsletter to hear more!

Thank you to my partner for creating a custom domain for the website as well as ensuring that this newsletter comes up when you google LilUbeReads. It’s a pretty cool feeling to see yourself on the Google search results page. 😏

And most importantly, thanks to all of you who are reading this! I look forward to sharing more seasonal recommendations and bookish updates with you and wish you a wonderful November! ✨

Stay cozy and keep on reading,

Jenna

“Sometimes, books just take us away for a little while, and return us to our place with a new perspective.”

― Sara Nisha Adams, The Reading List

Read these books before? Got any other recommendations? I’d love to hear your thoughts! 💖

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Happy fall, y'all!

The leaves are changing color, the temperatures are finally dropping, and cafes are selling pumpkin-apple-chai-spiced everything! 🍂 To celebrate the spooky/spoopy season, I've got book recommendations for you as well as a few updates about my reading life.

🧹For those of you who are looking for a cozy witchy fantasy, I recommend The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna. This book is great for people who loved the theme of found family and want to see more stories featuring orphaned children and misfits, just like The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune. There's a romantic subplot, a fun little twist, and an adorable dog named Circe!

👻 I'm not the biggest fan of horror, as I get easily scared and am very prone to nightmares. But this year, I finally ventured out of my comfort zone and tried a juvenile horror book! (Ok, so I maybe just tip-toed out of my comfort zone...) If you're like me and can barely cope with the adult horrors of our real world like climate change and capitalism, then Nightbooks by J.A. White is a good scary book for you! It follows the adventures of a young boy who loves writing scary stories and includes elements from Hansel and Gretel as well as One Thousand and One Nights. It was also adapted into a movie by Netflix back in 2021!

😱 Finally, if you're looking for something actually scary, not-so-cozy, and meant for adults, then look no further than Dark Matter by Blake Crouch. Although it is not officially categorized as a horror book and is more of a sci-fi thriller, I personally got the creeps and would describe the book as fast-paced and paranoia-inducing. The production of the TV series adaptation completed in April 2023 and I’m eagerly awaiting the announcement of the premiere date!

In my own reading life, I'm a little everywhere. Currently, I've got 7 books in-progress and I just can't seem to find the drive to finish one. It's so easy to just start another book! Hopefully by next issue, I'll have brought that number down to 3... but we'll see. This may be a little too optimistic.

I hope that one of these recommendations resonated with you but if not, there’s many more recs to come in the future!

This is the first issue of Lil Ube Reads, my newsletter focused on sharing my seasonal recommendations and bookish updates, and I'm so grateful that you took some time to read this! ✨

Stay cozy and far, far away from cannibalistic frogs,

Jenna

“It’s not always enough to go looking for the place we belong. Sometimes we need to make that place.”
― Sangu Mandanna, The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches

Read these books before? Got any other recommendations? I’d love to hear your thoughts! 💖

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