Read moreAudrey Zhou left Hickory Grove, the tiny town in central Illinois where she grew up, as soon as high school ended, and she never looked back. She moved to New York City and became the person she always wanted to be, complete with a high-paying, high-pressure job and a seemingly faultless fiancé, Ben. But if she and Manhattan-bred Ben are to build a life together, in the dream home his parents will surely pay for, Audrey can no longer hide him, or the person she’s become, from those she left behind.
But returning to Hickory Grove is . . . complicated. Audrey’s relationship with her parents has been soured by years of her mother’s astronomical expectations and slights. The friends she’s shirked for bigger dreams have stayed behind and started families. And then there’s Kyle, the easygoing stoner and her unrequited crush from high school that she finds herself drawn to again. Ben might be a perfect fit for New Audrey, but Kyle was always the only one who truly understood her growing up, and being around him again after all these years has Old Audrey bubbling up to the surface.
Over the course of one disastrous week, Audrey’s proximity to her family and to Kyle forces her to confront the past and reexamine her fraught connection to her roots before she undoes everything she’s worked toward and everything she’s imagined for herself. But is that life really the one she wants?
Journal with Me: Caitlyn’s 2023 Reading Journal
Happy happy New Year, dear readers! I’m so excited to be sharing some of my favorite spreads from my 2023 reading journal with you all!
In 2022 I set up a traveler sized reading journal, and though it was nice, I didn’t end up using it as much as I had wanted to. I thought that the traveler size would make me feel less pressured to create large and detailed spreads, and while it did achieve that, I actually felt that the size was really restrictive to my creative process and I ended up only using two spreads consistently.
For 2023, I really want to utilize this journal not only for tracking my reads, goals and challenges, but also for creative spreads for books that resonated with me throughout the year. This time around I decided to go with an 8×8 journal, and I’m feeling much more creatively inspired!
So, grab a cup of tea, get cozy and let’s take a look at some of my spreads for my 2023 reading journal!
*Note that I am not affiliated with any brands that are mentioned in this post.
Read moreLet’s Talk: Cossette’s 2023 Reading Goals, Content Goals & Tracking
Happy New Year, dear friends! I hope your 2023 is off to a great start, and is filled with lots of good reads, fun adventures, and good health. Personally speaking, I’m so glad to be back after a bit of a break — It’s definitely one I needed, and I’m excited for what the new year brings. Over this break, I did a lot of thinking about what I wanted my 2023 to look like as a reader, a blogger, and a bookstagrammer, and also started my reading journal. I thought it’d be fun to share some of my goals for the year with y’all here!
Read moreWrap Up: December 2022
Hello dear readers! Can you believe that 2022 has come to a close? We hope that you had a wonderful month and holiday season. It was a very good reading month here at teatimelit, so check out the post to see what we loved this month!
This month Caitlyn read 15 books, and Cossette read 20 books
Read moreAn Announcement
Hi, hello friends!
We hope you’ve had a lovely December so far, and that you’re all staying safe and cozy. We wanted to share a few quick announcements with you today!
First, we’ll be going on a hiatus from now until the new year! In the meantime, you can still find us on Twitter at @teatimelits, or on our personal bookstagrams — @readbycait for Caitlyn, @cossettereads for Cossette, and @bookswithmary for Mary.
With the new year brings some new changes as well. In case you missed it, Mary has stepped down from the blog. You can read more about this in her most recent blog post. When we’re back in January, we’ll also have some new graphics, and a new posting schedule — You can now expect posts from us on Tuesdays and Thursdays!
Lastly, our December pick — The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches — was our final tea time reads pick. We’ve really loved being your hosts and it genuinely has been wonderful reading with you, hearing your thoughts, getting excited about upcoming releases, and sharing recommendations. The server will stand for people to continue chatting, however we will not be continuing to run it as is.
Hope the rest of your December is wonderful!
Love,
Caitlyn, Cossette, & Mary
Let’s Talk: Five books I wish I could read again for the First Time
Hi, hello everyone! Welcome back to another post from me! Before we get into today’s post, I wish to inform you all that this will be my last post on teatimelit. I have adored my time creating content for the past two years, but it’s time for me to hang up my creator cap. Admittedly I’ve learned that creating blog content isn’t what I’m passionate about anymore, and that’s ok! I’ll still be hanging around in the book community, so if you want to see what I get up to and what I read feel free to follow me on Instagram @bookswithmary (revival pending) and Goodreads @maryreading. Thank you all for the most wonderful two years; I have loved engaging with you all and bonding over a shared love of books. But without further adieu, let’s get into this week’s post.
Read moreLet’s Talk: Cossette’s 23 Most Anticipated 2023 Releases
Hi, hello friends! With 2022 coming to an end, I thought it’d be fun to highlight my most anticipated releases for 2023. 2023 has so many incredible books coming out, and there so many other books I wanted to list but couldn’t!
Read moreLet’s Talk: My Favorite Reads of 2022 Part 2
Hello, friends! Can you believe that we’re approaching the end of 2022? I really can’t — I know I say it constantly, but time really is not real. It’s been a whirlwind of a year, and I’m looking forward to what’s in store for 2023!
As the end of the year is right around the corner, it’s time for my Favorite Reads of 2022 Part 2 post! You can check out Part 1 here. The books featured here are reads that were new to me in 2022 — and as of this post I’ve read almost 100 books in the second half of the year, it was definitely hard to narrow it down to the 12 listed here!
As always, I have done my best to list trigger warnings based on my own personal notes, trigger warnings from other reviews and what is listed on websites like Book Trigger Warnings and Trigger Warning Database if needed. That being said, there may be things that I have forgotten and if so I apologize! If you’ve read any of these books and notice that I’m missing some triggers, please let me know so that I can update the trigger lists!
✩ indicates an ARC / Read as an ARC
Read moreReview: Beach Read by Emily Henry
Read moreAugustus Everett is an acclaimed author of literary fiction. January Andrews writes bestselling romance. When she pens a happily ever after, he kills off his entire cast.
They’re polar opposites.
In fact, the only thing they have in common is that for the next three months, they’re living in neighboring beach houses, broke, and bogged down with writer’s block.
Until, one hazy evening, one thing leads to another and they strike a deal designed to force them out of their creative ruts: Augustus will spend the summer writing something happy, and January will pen the next Great American Novel. She’ll take him on field trips worthy of any rom-com montage, and he’ll take her to interview surviving members of a backwoods death cult (obviously). Everyone will finish a book and no one will fall in love. Really.
Blog Tour and Review: Five Survive by Holly Jackson
Read moreEight hours. Six friends. Five survive. A road trip turns deadly in this addictive YA thriller from the bestselling author of the worldwide phenomenon A GOOD GIRL’S GUIDE TO MURDER.
Red Kenny is on a road trip for spring break with five friends: Her best friend – the older brother – his perfect girlfriend – a secret crush – a classmate – and a killer.
When their RV breaks down in the middle of nowhere with no cell service, they soon realize this is no accident. They have been trapped by someone out there in the dark, someone who clearly wants one of them dead.
With eight hours until dawn, the six friends must escape, or figure out which of them is the target. But is there a liar among them? Buried secrets will be forced to light and tensions inside the RV will reach deadly levels. Not all of them will survive the night. . . .