Gorgeous gorgeous girls live their lives between the pages of a book.

Last year for me, it was 24 books to be exact. I bought a second bookshelf, started organising my books in colour order*, made a Goodreads account and create a bookstagram account. I am truly back in my 'hot girl reading' era and thriving. My self-set challenge for the year had been to read 52 books and though I barely made it halfway, it was a phenomenally good reading year. I read more good books than bad and discovered some authors I love.

*read: the correct way to organise your books

Shout outs to the Shameless podcast girlies for their stellar recommendations, Notion for letting me organise my library virtually with in-depth notes and my new but yet-to-be-named kindle.

Without further ado, here are the 10 stand-out books from 2022, ordered only by when I read them of course.

Since I read 28 books last year, I decided to make my reading goal for this year 30 books. I don’t set this goal for the sake of reading for achievement rather than for enjoyment but instead because reading is an activity I enjoy and want to be more intentional about.

If you’re someone who has also set themself a reading goal for 2023, I wish you a wonderful reading year but let me remind you that life is too short to wade through a book you don’t enjoy. For that reason, I am giving myself [and you] permission to stop reading any book you’re simply not into. It’s okay to DNF and re-read a comfort book instead.

cover image credit: <a href="https://www.freepik.com/free-photo/bookmark-book-arrangement-top-view_34002652.htm#page=4&query=books&position=3&from_view=search&track=sph">Freepik</a>