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Mini Reviews: Winterween Wrap Up

We all know I love a readathon and one of my favorites to participate in every year is Winterween hosted by GabbyReads! This year, Winterween was from January 9th – 15th and as always, I had a great time participating! Last month I posted my Winterween TBR, so of course, we’re doing a Winterween wrap up to see if I ended up reading all of the books I said I was going to read!

Grab yourself a cozy beverage of your choice, get comfy and let’s chat about the books that I read for Winterween!

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Reading Journal: 2026 Set Up

Aside from reading, crafting is my biggest hobby, and of the craft hobbies, journaling is my absolute favorite! I keep a lot of journals: my bullet journal, work journals (one for all year/general work and another just for summer camp programs), a theatre review journal, and I’m planning on starting and actually keeping up with a memory keeping journal this year. And of course, I have a reading journal!

Last year, I definitely fell off the reading journal wagon except for putting in my basic stats at the end of each month. However, this year, I’m feeling really motivated to keep up with it and I’ve been obsessively working on it!

I’ve had quite a journey with this reading journal already. I pre-ordered the Vintage Library journal from Archer & Olive in August, knowing that it wouldn’t arrive until mid-December. Then I started working on it the day after Christmas. I spent the entire weekend working on it and I was loving my set up and then…the worst happened. My tea spilled all over my desk and my journal, absolutely wrecking an entire journal set up. When I say that I had a breakdown about it, I mean I had a breakdown about it. It was actually incredibly upsetting. Luckily, I was able to save the majority of the stickers that I used since I had layered them on top of washi tape for decoration, and a blank journal on hand.

It took a little over a week, but I finally finished my setup and I’m so excited to share it with all of you! So, without further ado, let’s take a look at my 2026 reading journal.

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TBR: 26 in 2026

Hello 2026! I still don’t think it sounds like a real year, but whatever, it’s fine. It’s time to share with you my 26 in 2026!

I had so much fun doing this challenge last year, and ended up reading 21/25 books which is not bad at all. This year, however, I am determined to read all 26 books on this list, so I’ve been very specific about the books I’ve chosen. You may remember that last year I split my picks into different categories; I’m doing categories again this year, but with a twist. The requirement for every book on my 26 in 2026 list is that they have to be from my owned tbr. 

One of my goals every year is to read down my owned tbr. I don’t remember how many books I started with on my owned tbr in 2025, but we ended the year with 114 unread books from my personal library. Honestly, that’s not that bad of a number considering the amount of books that I did haul in 2025. Ideally, by the end of this year, even with all the books that I know I will end up purchasing or be gifted, I can end 2026 with under 100 unread books from my personal library. Hence the requirement for this year’s challenge being books that I already own.

Now that you know that bit of information, let’s get into the tbr! Grab your favorite beverage, get cozy and let’s go through my 26 in 2026!

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Let’s Talk: Top Books of 2025

It’s the last three days of 2025, which means it’s time to share my top books of 2025! 

Some months it was really easy to figure out what my favorite book of the month was, and some months were a little difficult because I read a lot of great books that month. For 2025, I’ll be sharing 12 honorable mentions — basically my second favorite read of each month — and my favorite book of each month.

Without further ado, get comfy and cozy and let’s chat about my top books of 2025!

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TBR: Winterween 2026

We are just weeks away from one of my favorite reading challenges, Winterween! Winterween is a yearly readathon hosted by GabbyReads and is a way to bring the Halloween vibes to the winter months! This year, Winterween is from January 9th – 15th and you know I’ve been planning my tbr since Gabby announced the readathon.

Grab your favorite beverage, get cozy, maybe turn on a Halloween playlist or film, and let’s talk about my Winterween tbr!

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TBR: 2026 Anticipated Releases

With the beginning of December comes the start of the end of the year blog posts and I could not be more excited! I have many of these end of the year type of posts planned for the month, but we’re going to start with one of my favorites, my anticipated reads of 2026!

If you’re curious as to which books are at the top of my list for 2026, grab yourself a comforting beverage, a cozy blanket and let’s talk about some 2026 releases!

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Wrap Up: November 2025

Okay, serious question, where did November go? I swear, it was the beginning of November and then I blinked and the month was over. As always, the end of the month comes monthly wrap up time!

Grab yourself the beverage of your choice, curl up with your favorite blanket and let’s review November!

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Review: Death and Dinuguan by Mia P. Manansala

Love is in the air for the citizens of Shady Palms, but Cupid’s arrow isn’t the only thing striking the town—not with another killer on the loose.

Things are looking up for the Brew-ha Cafe, and Lila Macapagal can’t think of anything that could break the spell, especially with Valentine’s Day coming up—she can’t wait to celebrate with her boyfriend, Jae Park. Adding to the lovey-dovey atmosphere is Hana Lee, Shady Palms’s newest resident. She’s also Jae’s beloved cousin and chocolatier at Choco Noir, the latest addition to the town’s culinary offerings. Everything is coming into place for Hana, who left her old life in Minnesota behind to work at Choco Noir, owned by her best friend.

Unfortunately, beneath the sweet surface of Shady Palms runs a bitter undercurrent, as a series of attacks against women-owned businesses in the area escalates from petty theft to assault and murder when Hana is found knocked unconscious inside Choco Noir, and the chocolate shop owner is put out of business—for good.

With Hana left in a coma, a murderer hiding amongst them, and the safety of the women entrepreneurs of Shady Palms at risk, the Park brothers team up with the Brew-ha crew to put a stop to the villain before they strike again.

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Readathon: Taylor Swift Eras Readathon December 1st – 31st

Last month I saw someone doing a The Life of a Showgirl readathon that looked so fun, but I wasn’t able to participate because I had so much going on. That then got me thinking that it would be fun to do a Taylor Swift Eras themed readathon and so the Taylor Swift Eras Readathon planning began!

The readathon will be taking place the entire month of December, the 1st – 31st, in honor of Taylor’s birthday on the 13th! There is a prompt for each album, as well as some bonus prompts that I thought would be fun. You can either read 1 book per prompt or try to double up on prompts, really, you can do whatever you would like!

I’ll mainly be hosting the readathon on my Bookstagram @readbycait, so be sure to follow along there and to use the hashtags #tserasreadathon #taylorerasreadathon to see what others are reading! I’ll have story templates that you can use to track your reading progress both highlighted on my Bookstagram, and in this post as well, so be sure to save those to use while you’re reading!

Alright, now that we’ve gone over the basics of the readathon, let’s talk about the prompts!

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