Good morning, good afternoon, good evening friends! How are you ? I hope you’re doing all great! We are already in the last week of 2016, can you believe it?Β I can’t, but I am hoping all the best for the year to come.
Today’s Wednesday, and every two weeks I’m using this day to rant and rave about blogging things with my Blogging Ways feature. However, today, since this is the last week of the year – did I already say that? Probably.-, I have decided to do something a bit different. Still kind of fitting into this, because…well, it’s all thanks to blogging.
So, welcome this list of the BEST books I have read this year! And damn, I read a lot of these. I’m going to try and NOT rant too much in this, otherwise that post will be 10000 words too long. So I’ll try to limit myself to…well, THREE WORDS. Or four. I might be cheating a bit. Alright, let’s start this challenge.
Best books I read in 2016 – 5 stars reads
The Wrath and The Dawn / The Rose and The Dagger, Renee Ahdieh
Rollercoaster. Fierce. Diverse. ALL THE FEELS.
The Sky is Everywhere, Jandy Nelson
ALL THE TEARS HERE.
Cress / Winter, Marissa Meyer
Addictive. Best crew.
The Raven Boys, Maggie Stiefvater
Stunning. Imaginative. NOAH.
The Summer of Chasing Mermaids, Sarah Ockler
Summery feelings. Diverse. CRUSH.
Hello, Goodbye and everything in between, Jennifer E. Smith
Tears, goodbyes and everything in between.
Unique reading experience.
Honorable mentions – 4 stars reads I quite couldn’t forget
A Darker Shade of Magic / A Gathering of Shadows, V. E. Schwab
WHAT IS THIS SERIES. (more than three words but I can’t express my feelings for this properly.
Second Chance Summer, Morgan Matson
Morgan Matson = QUEEN. Also, the tears are real.
Illuminae, Amie Kaufman & Jay Kristoff
WHAT DID I JUST READ.
The Serpent King, Jeff Zentner
Silently beautiful / heartbreaking.
Yay! We have Illuminae in common! And I hope to read a lot of them from this list!
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Yay I’m glad to hear it! I hope you’ll love the books π
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I loved your post, the idea of ββdescribing books with few words is great and goes straight to the point :). Surely I will take some for my TBR!
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Oh thank you so, so much, so glad you liked this! I hope you’ll add a few to your TBR, and love them as much as I did π
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Great post and a cool idea! I’m posting my top books of the year post in a bit – I need to check it first before it goes live, wordpress – say no more!lol I just copied part of my original review for each book into the post, wish I’d thought of this as it’s a great idea. π
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Oh thank you, Drew, so glad you enjoyed this! π I am so impatient to see your post! And, well, if you want, you can always do it as I did it, if it inspires you π
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Thank you, I posted it a few minutes ago, mainly fantasy reads. π I may well do in future, but my post had to stay the same this time, I had so much hassle with wordpress while drafting it that I didn’t touch it in case anything messed up on it, just checked it and prayed it posted alright! π It is a great idea though, sometimes less is more and describing a book in 3 words or even a sentence is a cool way to do it. π
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Ohhh well I’ll check it out right now then, and I always need to discover more fantasy books π
Haha, I get the struggle, it’s hard for a post to be perfect and aligned and everything on wordpress, it takes me SO long at times to do it right, haha. π
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Ha, perfect and aligned, I was happy to settle for it just being right! π It was a nightmare, the colour wouldn’t changed to black only on certain bits no matter what I did, I had to keep deleting bits and adding them again until it worked and then it kept putting no gaps between the paragraphs!lol Nightmare, was glad to finish it! π
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Hahaha, well sometimes it takes me HOURS to write a blog post…No, strike that. It takes me half an hour to write a blog post when I’m struggling, then another hour to do all the formatting right, hahaha.
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Lol, I think they need to change wordpress and call it, gggrrrr wordpress due to its issues! π
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Hahaha yes that’d be fitting.
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I need to read The Wrath and the Dawn so badly! It’s been on my shelf for over a year!
AND THE RAVEN CYCLE HAS BEEN ON NEARLY EVERY SINGLE END OF YEAR POST TODAY. It’s like the whole universe is mad at me for not reading the last two books yet. Ugh.
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OHhh yes you do! It’s such a great series, I loved it so much! π Haha, well I haven’t read the last two books yet either hahaha so we’re two. Let’s make that our 2017 resolution ?
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Thank you for this list. I just added the ones I haven’t read to my wish list.
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You’re welcome, I hope you’ll find books you love π
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The serpent King is amazing. And all these mini reactions were great, really. You really distilled the essence of the story. I really appreciate d Salt to the Sea, Tamora Pierce, The Sun is Also A Star, and The Intern this year, but there are so many good books βΊοΈππ
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Oh thank you so, so much Shanti, I’m so happy you liked it π I really want to read The Sun is Also a Star, glad to hear you enjoyed it!
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So many of these books are on my TBR! That makes me even more excited to read them!
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OH I’m glad to hear it! I hope you’ll enjoy them as much as I did π
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I’ll add some of this in my TBR. Thank you for this post and also, The Lunar Chroniclesβ oh my gaaah!!! xxx
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YES, The Lunar Chronicles is one of the BEST series ever β€ Thank you so much, I hope you'll enjoy the books as much as I did π
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Illuminae and Winter are two of my favorite books of 2016 too π
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yay!! Both were so, so good π Thank you for stopping by! π
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I read so many brilliant books this year that it’s hard to choose. I, like you, would definitely say The Wrath and the Dawn and A Gathering of Shadows though. A Little Life was the best adult fiction I read, Metamorphoses the best classic, More Happy Than Not for contemporary (with some scifi), ReLife as the best manga/graphic novel, and The Winner’s Curse for series. XD
I hope that 2017 will prove to be another great year of reading for the both of us. ^.^
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Ohhh I’m glad to hear you talking about More Happy Than Not, I thought that it was a great book, it broke my heart haha, but I loved it π Thank you, Summer, I hope this will be a great reading year as well π
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The Wrath & the Dawn is on my TBR so I’m really excited to see it at the top of your Best Of list. Loved ADSOM too!
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Ohhh I’m eager to hear your thoughts about that series, I loved it so much! Thank you π
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Great list Marie, and I loved your idea of only choosing three words to describe how much you enjoyed these books as well. I definitely got the impression from your post that these were ultimate favourites for you for 2016.
If I’d read Cress and Winter this year they’d have been on my list as well, same with Illuminae (you really need to read Gemina soon, it’s such an amazing book, even better than Illuminae I’d say!) And I’m glad to see the Shades of Magic books made your list too! π β€
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Oh thank you so much, Beth! And I have read Gemina! I finished it a couple of days ago and I LOVED IT. It was even crazier than the first book, but I loved it so much! π
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Oh that’s great to hear! I really am glad you loved that book and yes definitely crazy. For most of the last part I was on the edge of my seat waiting to see what happened next!
I’ll be keeping an eye out for your review, and now we can talk about how insane the wait is going to be for the third one! π
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Oh yes, me too. It was really intense from beginning to end! I don’t know how I’m going to write my review haha.
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It was a difficult review for me to write as well, I think part of me just wanted to put incoherent screams in every paragraph because I wasn’t over what happened and how it ended! π
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Well I can’t wait to start writing this review haha.
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Great list, Marie!
I also read The Wrath & The Dawn this year and I enjoyed it a lot. I loved the diverse elements; although some of them were hard to understand, I was very pleased with the characters. I’m very excited about reading the next one!
The Raven Cycle is such a fantastic series! I was very happy to conclude it this year, but I’m sure I’ll miss these characters a lot. I also have to continue on with The Lunar Chronicles; I only read Cinder, but it was one of my favorite reads of the entire year, so I’m sure I’ll love the other books as well.
Illuminae and The Sky is Everywhere are definitely on my 2017 TBR. I am hardly ever updated on releases, but I’ll try my best next year, hahah.
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Thank you so much Lais! I’m glad you enjoyed The Wrath and The Dawn, and I hope you will love the sequel just as much π
I can’t wait to read the last two books in The Raven Cycle series, I loved the first two books so much, and this cast of characters is perfect β€
Can't wait for you to read all of the books, and I hope you'll have a fantastic reading year! π
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Loved this post so much! Totally understand your Illuminae love, I’m literally dying for the last instalment in the Autumn
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Thank you so much! I can’t wait to read the last book in the series, especially after the cliffhanger at the end of Gemina….I can’t WAIT.
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I know, I’m dying to know what happens!
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Me too! I hate waiting hahaha.
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I’ve only read Cress in your 5 star category!! :O I think I’ve had The Wrath and The Dawn on my shelf for AGES but I just haven’t gotten around to it yet – will definitely do so ASAP!! π
Glad to see that ADSOM/AGOS made your four star list though – I know I adored ADSOM ^_^
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Ohh I hope you’ll read The Wrath and The Dawn soon, it is SUCH a great book, I loved it π Thank you so much Geraldine! π
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I actually got a friend of mine to buddy read it with me! But we both never started it…I’ll have to push the both of us to read it!
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Haha, oh YES you both should, and I hope you will love it β€ β€
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I loved the way you described them!!
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Oh thank you so much! π
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Great post idea!
(See what I did there :P) I agree wholeheartedly with your description of the Lunar Chronicles. Glad you enjoyed that series!
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Thank you so, so much Lauren! π I really loved The Lunar Chronicles, wish I could re-read it for the first time π
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So happy to see The Raven Cycle, Shades of Magic and Illuminae on this list β₯β₯β₯ So glad you enjoyed those π
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Thank you so much, Lauren! I loved these books so much. And Gemina…that ending…WHAT are we supposed to do now?!
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I LOVE CRESS SO MUCH. And THAT scene in Winter? Omg. I have so much love for Carswell Thorne. SO MUCH.
Ahem.
I have read the first two Raven Cycle books and I LOVE them so far. I can’t believe I put off reading any Maggie Stiefvater for so long because of Twilight related high school prejudice! I am a foolish human.
I hope you had a lovely Christmas π xx
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YES ME TOO. I am just SO in love with him haha, that scene was just perfect β€
Thank you so much! I hope you had a wonderful Christmas as well, and will have a great new year's! β€
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Love the idea! You can always say you don’t know how to count :p Four is close to three, right??
I still haven’t started The Lunar Chronicles but I took the book with me here to start when the year begins π
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Thank you my sweechie!! Haha you’re right, four is close enough :p
OH YES! I am so proud of you. Can’t wait to know if you enjoyed it, and I hope you will! β€
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This is a neat idea, but I feel like I would spend half a day just thinking about three words to summarize a book I love. Haha. And yay for the Lunar Chronicles and Raven Cycle! They’re awesome series π
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Haha well it took me a bit of time for some books… But well, still less than writing a full review.
Thank you Jamie! β€
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So many amazing books, Marie! I loved The Wrath and the Dawn, Raven Cycle, Lunar Chronicles and the Shades of Magic series so much as well! And so many others are still on my TBR, like Second Chance Summer and Illuminae…
Also, great job on describing your feelings for these books in 3 words! I especially relate to your description of the Shades of Magic series, because OMG, SO AMAZING!
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Thank you so much! I’m so glad you can relate and love all of these books so much. I loved Shades of Magic so much, I can’t wait to know what happens next!
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What a unique way to get straight to the point instead of rambling on π
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Haha thank you, glad you liked it π
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You’re welcome π
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I really, really cannot believe it’s the end of the year- in fact I refuse to accept it!! Great post- love how you did it all in 3 words!! And Darker Shade of Magic was on my top ten last year and both Serpent king and Illuminae were on my honorary mentions too!!
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I can’t believe it either, but I hope next year will be better ahah π Thank you!! β€
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haha yes- you’re welcome! β€
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This was such a fun post to read! I read A Darker Shade of Magic and The Raven Cycle this year and I feel exactly the same about both! I can’t wait to pick up A Gathering of Shadows next month and when Maggie Stiefvater’s new Ronan-centred series comes out I’ll definitely be grabbing copies of that! π
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Ohh I can’t wait for you to read A Gathering Of Shadows as well. I loved it so, so much, I thought it was a good sequel. But well…you can wait ’til it’s closer to the 3rd book’s release date, because having to wait is so long haha π
I am SO eager to read this new Maggie Stiefvater series, I love Ronan so much, he’s maybe my favorite β€ Thank you Kate! β€
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Ahh Marie I shared MOST of your favorite books here! Should I start listing them one by one?hahaha but most of all : The Wrath & the Dawn, The Serpent King, and The Sky is Everywhere! I loved them SO MUCH and I’m also super excited for the movie adaptation of TSIE, hope it’s as good as the book β€ and I can't believe 2016 is almost over either! There are so many good and bad things that happened to me this year and it was a memorable year after all! Hope 2017 will be even better for all of us π
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OH YES, I am too, I’m a bit nervous about it, but still, I’d enjoy seeing TSIE on the big screen! I hope next year will be even better for you then! Thank you! β€
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Illuminae and Shades of Magic are all SPOT ON. I love reading these summaries. They make me so happy, and honestly, often connect me more to books than reviews I read. For example, I haven’t read The Wrath and the Dawn, and reviews have kept me lukewarm. This? This sold me. I’ve added it to my TBR shortlist. π
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OH YES. This made me so, SO happy. In that case, maybe I should make word reviews like this a thing? I wonder..
I’m glad you added The Wrath and The Dawn to your TBR, it is such a good book, I loved it so much. Can’t wait for you to read it! π
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You should!! I would totally read them forever. They fill me with joy. And I can’t wait to read it! So many good books, so little time.
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Ohh well maybe I will then, thank you π
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“ALL THE TEARS HERE” YES! That’s exactly how I would describe The Sky is Everywhere. That book is so good and I’m glad to see it on your top list because it’s one of my all time favorites. I so need to get on reading Illuminae and ADSOM because they’ve been recommended to me so many times. I actually plan on binge-reading the SOM books after ACOL is released. I love how you were able to describe your favorites in three or four words because I would be terrible at that. I struggle with not rambling in reviews. π
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I am so, so happy you love The Sky is Everywhere as much as I did. That book is just perfect. It made me cry so much, and there are SO many emotions here, but it’s wonderful. I can’t wait for you to read Illuminae and ADSOM, and I hope you’ll love these books as much as I did! π Haha, it was SO hard not to ramble ππ
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It really is and it did the same to me. I’ve reread it several times since I first read it and every time it gets to me. Have you read I’ll Give You The Sun?
I hope so to. Yes! Sometimes there’s just too much I want to say about a book. π
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I have! I loved it so, so much as well; Both are my favorites. I can’t wait for Jandy Nelson’s next book! π
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I can’t wait for her next book either! I know there’s a short synopsis for the one she’s currently working on on GR and it sounds like it’s going to be good. π
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I read it, and YES it sounds like it’s going to be just as good as her previous books π
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I am super happy about this list, also because I feel at least partially responsible in you reading the books for some of them and others were buddy reads. π Also, super glad that Noah, aka my baby, was mentioned. I am afraid you won’t be entirely happy with the following books in that series ……
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Yes, you are responsible for a LOT of the greatest reads I had this year, and THANK YOU for that. Hm…this is making me a bit worried about reading that series now….
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You’re very welcome! I am just happy when people like the same books I recommend.
I still loved the Raven Cycle, but Noah deserved better …. π¦
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Oh, well… now you are making me want to read the whole series. I need to buy The Raven King soon.
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You SHOULD read the whole series at some point hahaha pretty sure that’s why you started it in the first place .. .to read it all hahaha
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Hahaha you’re right. SO many books to read…
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Many of these books are on my TBR π I also read A Darker Shade of Magic and The Raven Cycle this year. They also earned spots on my favorite books of 2016 list. Cheers to an even better 2017!
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Ohh well I can’t wait for you to read them all, they are wonderful β€ Thank you so much, happy new year! β€
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Hey, I’m actually reading TWATD right now!!! I’ve owned it for way too long, but thankfully a readathon was a great incentive to finally get it off my TBR, haha. I’ve read about 1/3 of it and I’m liking it a lot so far! The characters are really interesting, the setting is gorgeous, and all the food descriptions make me hungry. lol
I also started the audiobook for ADSOM in late December and got half way through but had to put it aside because of the Dumbledore’s Army redathon, but I hope to return to it soon. It’s really good! Definitely saw what the hype was all about.
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Ohhh so happy to hear it, and that you’re enjoying it! These food descriptions are torture, right, haha, it always made me SO hungry to read this book. Hope you’ll keep on loving it, and like the sequel as well! π
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I’ve read one of these books on your list! I best try the other ones if their your favourites, I always know you have good book taste π
I’ve heard tons of amazing things about The Wrath and The Dawn but I have never picked it up for myself yet. Definitely one I need to check out this year π
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Oh thank you so much Hanna! I’m so happy you trust my bookish taste, and I hope you won’t be disappointed π
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