The people we hate at the wedding (twice once on my own and once with Abdiel) (This movie is so damn good)
The hustle
The love guru 2008 (with Abdiel)
Game Night
Rec (this is a horror film in Spanish that completely took me by surprise with how good it was. It was only at the end it did a really trope heavy thing, but other then that it was genuinely uncomfortable and horrifying to watch. I loved it!)
Midsommar (with Abdiel)
Tv shows watched
Anime watched
Science fell in love so I tried to prove it season 1 and 2
Attack on titan season 2
Writing done
Research for secret book
Games played
Fortnite
Undertale
Doki doki literature club (I got the platinum)
Meet your maker
Plague tale requiem
Games purchased/received: Meet Your Maker, Tails of Iron, and Sackboy a big adventure, sagebrush, doki doki literature club, a plague tale requiem, Cinders, Nier Automata, Nier Replicant
Art I did
Most of it was practice art works and messing around with my tablet and a lot of it isn’t serious and pretty bad so they will stay a mystery
Manga read
Spy x family volume 1
Girl Taking Over: A Lois Lane Story
Books read
Girl Taking over: A Lois Lane Story
Books Bought/ Received
Spy x family volume 2
Girl Taking Over: A Lois Lane Story
Exercise done
Not much
Life stuff:
Had a lovely date with my partner. The Greek restaurant we went to was a delight and so delicious.
Also this month we went to one of our favorite Mexican restaurants:
This time we forgot to take food pictures, but as always the food was amazing.
All in all, I’d say I accomplished a lot this month. It’s been a really enjoyable month all things considered.
I’ve been afraid to do a goals post for a long while. Even if I’ve done them in the past I’ve tended to fail every single one of them in the recent times. However, I don’t know exactly why, but I truly believe in myself for this month of May. I have purpose. I have a drive and I have decided to expect more of myself for once in my life. Not only to expect it of myself, but to accomplish what I’ve set out to do.
To begin I’ve awaken extra early this morning. I set my alarm for 6am and got up at 5:40. It was an initial shock to me that my body got me up before my alarm. However, I feel it’s because I really and truly do want this.
I have curbed my ambition for a very long time, but the time feels like now for me to embrace my ambition and go for everything I’m wanting to accomplish.
This goals post being on the 29th instead of the 30th has a purpose too. I have a very special announcement tomorrow that I hope my fellow readers will very much enjoy.
Beyond that, yes indeed this blog will be a daily one once more. I feel that it is time to break the cycle of wanting this and not following through and that goes for everything that I discuss here.
I will be focusing on my bodily and nutritional health this month. I will limit myself to 1 Popsicle/ice cream/treat at the end of the day. I will do my best to avoid processed foods. I will make myself a nice breakfast every morning. For some reason I always know I can make myself some really tasty eggs and I don’t do it and now I can’t make any excuses. I will have only healthy snacks during the day: vegetables, fruit, or nuts.
I will also be exercising this month. It could be a video exercise or a dance tutorial or if I don’t bring myself to exercise early enough 100 squats and sit-ups before I take a shower. It feels like I should be able to make time during the week in the mornings and then on the weekends do the sit ups and squats.
I will get all my homework done in a timely manner and have it nicely paced throughout the week and in a way where I get 2 to 3 days of no homework per week.
I will be writing a book for at least 1 hour everyday. It doesn’t matter if I do it in 10 minute sprints here and there I need to be writing that long everyday.
I will be reading for at least 30 minutes everyday. Added to that that I must finish what I start I will at least have several books read by the end of this month.
I have finally also purchased the screen protector I can use to draw with for my iPad. So this means I will be drawing everyday and either doing a tutorial drawing everyday or a regular one to practice and get better at using my iPad for drawing.
The book I will be finishing reading this month first will be:
Capturing the devil
I wanted to finish this last month but I froze again and it didn’t happen. I’ve read the beginning parts of it and that’s about it. However, this month will be a completely different story. This month I will read a lot more. If I do it right I should finish at least 6 to 10 books this May.
The game I will be focused on the platinum for this month:
A Plague Tale Requiem
This game is the sequel to Plague Tale: Innocence which was a masterpiece and one of the most amazing platinum experiences that I’ve ever had. I truly love this series and I can’t wait to add Plague Tale Requiem to my platinum trophies list.
Anime series I will finish this month:
Attack on Titan season 3 and 4
During my downtime I will be completing Attack on titan seasons 3 and 4. I’ve been trying to complete the series for a little while, but I’ve fallen into the trap of starting other things. So in May this gets completed.
All in all, this is all that I wish to accomplish this coming month. I have high hopes to do really well. It is all achievable. I want to make myself proud again. My reward for actually completing everything as I want to is the same as last month:
The Monica nendoriod. Since I have completed the Doki Doki platinum last month, I think having her figure will be an awesome little personal trophy to always commemorate one of my favorite games.
In my life I feel like every time I take a step forward another crazy awful thing happens. Each thing hits me again with emotional turmoil and so much stress and I feel paralyzed to move forward. I have so many people in my life that believe in me and every-time I decide this is the day I move forward, because I’m so damn afraid of another awful thing happening there I stand frozen. I know that people see me as capable. I know people see that I have the potential to do great things. Yet when I get up in the morning my body gets all tied up in itself and I find myself saying just one more hour of sleep and when I finally do get up I accomplish a small fraction of what I wanted to.
Yet, because I do have moments where I do accomplish some form of something I have so many people believe in me. When I think about those people. Especially when I think of my partner and his unwavering support of me it brings me to tears. My family believes in my ability to write too and they just get frustrated with me because I get so frozen and I give up.
Just this blog is a perfect example. How many times have I told myself todays the day I promise to keep this blog going? How many times have I thought to myself, this is the day I start to write again. Then I sit down and I try to get myself to simply open up a document and begin writing and the amount of excuses that come up instantly it’s too much.
Yet I do not know any other way then to keep trying. I keep being pulled back to it and back to it. Internally I know if I do all that I need to that I will feel so accomplished. That I will feel healthier. That I will feel better about myself because I decided to put the effort into something and look where it took me. I used to feel that way about my blog all the time. The people I’d met through here. The authors and publishers I built a relationship with. The excitement to read. It’s a hole in my heart I let get bigger and bigger because I didn’t want to accept the one painful situation out of this that ever came out of it and to accept the other painful situations that are happening in my life currently.
I’m so tired of it. I’m so tired of denying myself things out of pain. I’m so tired of disappointing myself. I’m tired of disappointing my family because I can’t get my shit together and write because I feel frozen in an emotion that doesn’t serve me one iota of good. I’m tired of the anxiety of worrying that I’ll disappoint my partner even though no matter what I do he consistently just believes in me and comforts me through all of my feelings. I am so tired of feeling tired. I am so tired of feeling unfulfilled. I am so tired of feeling stuck in a time where absolutely nothing of value feels like it’s happening.
I’m tired of feeling sad and depressed and of looking at all the damn books on my shelves I’ve refused to pick up. I want action. I want to dedicate myself to myself. I want to fucking feel better about myself. I want to support myself in a healthy way and be proactive and to be more.
The problem with Freezing is you cannot completely control it and you see yourself like a statue in a snow-globe and the storms just happen to you and you can’t move because of them. I want to release myself from that glass dome. I want to fucking hurl it against the wall and move again. I want to be free from being frozen.
I have had a serious problem with being unable to finish the things that I start. It doesn’t matter if it’s a tv show or a game or a book series a lot of the time I leave thing undone. So, from now in each category I will only be focusing on one thing at a time until I have completed it.
For example: in gaming I love to platinum games. It gives me a huge feeling of accomplishment that I got to do everything in a game there was to do and that I have mastered it and appreciated it to its fullest. However, that doesn’t happen as often as when I first got my PlayStation. I haven’t gotten a platinum for anything all year long. So from now on I will put my full focus on one game at a time.
For now I will be focusing on Doki Doki Literature Club.
I have already finished this game once however I need a few more play throughs focusing on doing various tasks in order to get all the trophies that I need for the platinum. Doki Doki is such a hard hitting game that deals with themes of suicide, depression, and obsession. It is a beautifully made game and I can’t wait to 100% it. If you’ve never played it I highly recommend it especially to my fellow readers. I don’t think it’d disappoint any of you.
The Book I will focus on will be:
Capturing the Devil by Kerri Maniscalco
This is the final book of the “Stalking Jack the Ripper” series. Looking back I finished the 3rd book “Escaping from Houdini” on September 18th, 2018. That was a bit over 4 years ago. Yeah I’m a bit ashamed about this one. Not to mention I’ve had this book on my shelves for a good amount of that time too. I had started reading this book the other day for a short time. I had to keep pausing to text my partner about it because he’s literally my Thomas Cresswell. Abdiel is as thoughtful and as loving and unapologetically supportive of me as Thomas is to Audrey. He’s literally done the nose kiss Thomas does to Audrey in the first few chapters of this book and in a similar context and I had to stop myself from actually screaming cause of how overwhelmed I felt. I’ve been with Abdiel for over 3 years and he still makes me feel that way.
The one anime I will be focusing on:
Science Fell in Love so I Tried to Prove it
This is another thing that had me texting my partner constantly cause of the ways it reminded me of us. It’s so cute and so nerdy. The entire show is trying to find a mathematical proof for love. It reminded me of a time where Abdiel made a math equation about his love for me.
Essentially it means as he loves me over time his love is continually growing towards infinity. It’s been a long time and his explanation is much better then mine, but that’s the basic concept of it. I feel all mushy now.
Anyway, the show is light, fun, nerdy, and wholesome. I will be finishing it soon and then going back to watching and finishing Attack on Titan very soon.
One writing project:
Here is where I announce I have been working on and researching for a secret book project. What there is to know is that I’ve been seriously considering self-publishing this project. I am also considering writing it nanowrimo style when I feel it’s been sufficiently researched. This book has so much more planning then I’m used to putting into a book. However, I know that when it all comes together it’ll be the best book it could possibly be for all of it.
So now that everything has been decided all that is left to do is to commit and complete all these things. With everything that gets done a new thing will replace it. However, I will feel much more accomplished when I’ve given my all fully to each thing.
THANK YOU ALL FOR READING! Let me know your thoughts down in the comments below! Thank you all for reading this through and sitting through me being gushy about my partner. He is steady and I appreciate him everyday.
I plan for April to be a pretty busy month for me. At this point my plans are to prove to myself if not anyone else that I can do what I’m passionate about and be successful in doing it.
I am very tired of having to just talk about what I want to do and simply not do it. I understand why I keep falling behind and being unable to move forward, but the bad stuff is going to keep happening. For once, I rather be in a good place and let that stuff happen and roll with it, then be in a bad place while it happens.
So here is what I am going to do. I am going to write every morning. First, the blog post of the day. Regardless what time I wake up as long as I get that done I will be starting my day right.
Secondly, I will write 1,000 words towards a novel. If that takes me less then an hour then I will write for the full hour and see how much I end up writing. I’ve been doing research the last couple of days towards writing an old idea that I feel I can take on so much better now then I would have in the past.
Thirdly, when my new term starts I will be doing 1 to 2 hours of homework depending on how many assignments I have. I will do more or less depending on how intensive my classes are.
Fourthly, I will try to get in 30 minutes of reading. I don’t have as much time to read as I used to, but I want to at least get in some time for it here and there when I can manage it.
After all that if I manage to have time I’ll do a dance workout. I’ve been wanting to learn BTS and Twice dances and that’ll be a fun way to allow myself to have extra fun.
Then, if I have time before work, I wanna try and do my makeup more again. I’ve been neglecting it out of pure sadness and apathy. I want to start doing that again.
If I can do all that everyday for the month of April then I will reward myself. I have started collecting nendoriods. If the nendo Monika from Doki Doki Literature Club is still available then I’ll love to get her.
I think she is just adorable and I already preordered Natsuki whose coming in October. I truly hope they eventually make the other two girls as Nendos. I would be so happy.
If I can manage all of that and be able to do a full wrap up at the end of the month and feel accomplished instead of defeated, I will be very proud and so happy.
THANK YOU ALL FOR READING! Let me know your thoughts down in the comments below!
I have a lot of problems with getting myself to do what I’m aching to do. It has effected a lot of my life and because my life has been so messy all the time recently I feel like I might as well surrender to the mess and go with the chaos and just do what I want.
So my plan is simple. Decide what I want to do and do it. First things first. The reason I haven’t posted since the last post was I got scammed twice, lost myself to depression, and found comfort in my many conversations with my partner after. To put it colorfully I fucked up. The anxiety kept me from school work and because it was my last week of the term I became a hermit and could only do school work for a time.
The great part is this. I’m tired of being behind. I’m tired of so much outside bullshit happening and I’m ready to actually just focus and take the world by storm. My world.
I’m not here to convince anyone to be, do, or think a certain way. I’m here to share myself and my ideas and learn and create and become more and different all the time. On my journey, I share what I feel should be shared in order to give something to others to connect with and feel inspired from on their own journeys.
I’m here to have fun and share fun and to mess up and to do really really well and to love and jump and dance and decide and I am finally ready to live. To live for me. To live and just give my damn soul to my desires. To feel vigorously and beautifully alive.
So firstly I am going to do one of the most fun and incredible things by finally writing my Scooby doo fanfic. I have wanted to do this for so long. I have loved Scooby Doo since I was a child. One of my favorite pictures in the world is one of me in the mystery machine that happened to be serviced at an auto repair place. My heart lit up to be there.
I want to write a mystery for our beloved Mystery Inc. friends to solve. Maybe make it a little darker then our friends tend to experience, but still at the heart Scooby Dooby Doo. Once it’s finished I’ll either publish it on wattpad or figure out another place to publish it, but regardless this is something I would like you all to experience and read.
This also means watching some of the movies and tv shows of Scooby for research and seeing at the heart what makes Scooby so great and how I can make a story that unique yet still holds that Scooby Doo specialness at the center.
Believing in myself to write this passion project will be the first time in a long time I’ve allowed myself to honor myself and let go of doubt. Doubt does nothing to serve me. It’s crippled me. It’s made me think I’m a failure. It’s driven me to inaction again and again and I say enough. It’s enough.
I am here. I am going to read and write and play games and write whatever posts I damn well please on this blog. I will do it everyday that I can.
Another thing that sets my heart on fire is learning some dances because it pleases me. So I will do that as well. Maybe, I’ll post video on here at some point. Maybe I’ll keep it to myself. Either way I’m going to have fun.
Also, exploring makeup more. I wear makeup most days and I love to experiment, but there’s never too much of that and I think when I’m more confident I’ll share some looks on instagram and see what comes of it.
The last thing that’s important to me to mention is continuing my best thing that happened in a day journal going. Even on days that are extremely depressing. I want to remember that there is good in every day.
I realize now with the fact I haven’t given up. In spite of everything. That I’m here typing this right now at almost 3 am. That that’s how done I am with inaction. As well as the complete joy I feel writing this. Now I can truly say I am back and here to stay. So much to come. I am ready now.
THANK YOU ALL FOR READING! Let me know your thoughts down in the comments below!
The other day I got an email from a representative of St. Martin’s press offering a e-arc copy of S. Jae-Jones “Guardians of Dawn: Zhara” for me to review. This was unexpected and completely mind blowing to me as I have not been an active reviewer for quite some time. What also was unexpected was my reaction. I read the email and I sobbed. Not normal sobbing either, I was sobbing like someone who was grieving a loved one. I had thought this part of my life, writing, reading, being a reviewer, had been put behind me. Yet even after so long people are still remembering me as someone who’d they’d like to support and promote their books.
It pains me so much that I’ve left this industry for so long. It tears at my heart. I flooded with tears because I realized there was still a place for me here. A place for me to be a champion for books and to spread the love and passion for stories that has always lived inside me. Yet even as I write this I feel the drum of anxiety inside me. The desire is so true yet so is the idea that I’ve not done this for so long that I don’t know how to begin to return. I’ve failed so many times to come back for a reason. What if I can’t do it? What if I’m not good enough anymore?
Yet, I still got that email. I still had someone look at my other reviews of S. Jae Jones Wintersong and Shadowsong and they decided that I was worth reaching out too. Even with my poor Netgalley ratio of 56%. Even when I haven’t been in the game for several years. They still thought to give me an opportunity I’m sure many others are really hoping for themselves. Everything in me screams at me not to waste it.
Truth be told I’ve been afraid to be active on my blog the way I once was. To give so much of myself to this incredible community again because I know that there’s several tragedies in my life that have been coming for a while now and I’m afraid to start this again only to be blindsided by loss once again and feel forced to leave again out of my own grief.
I feel like I keep ignoring my call and the more I ignore it the more it contributes to my sadness. So for once I’m picking up the phone and committing myself once more and trusting that I’ve been called for a reason and things will be ok.
So I’ve decided and I know it’ll be a lot of work, but I think building this blog back up and expressing myself through writing once more is the best thing for me to do. I’m excited. I have a writing project that I’ll announce that’ll be up on wattpad for those interested to read for free. It’ll take a couple months for me to put it together and write it all, but I feel it’ll be worth it.
I’ll stream on the rare occasions that I’ll get. It’s pretty rare because after I started streaming my dad changed his sleeping schedule and I can only stream when he is asleep. I am a bit bummed about it cause I had just gotten a vtuber model to work. It is what it is.
I don’t have an excuse anymore and I’m as ready as I’ll ever be to continue here. It’s time. Time to be The Book Raven once more. I’m here to stay in both good and bad times. So you all will be hearing from me a lot once more.
THANK YOU ALL FOR READING! Let me know your thoughts down in the comments below!
My master plan has been brewing for quite some time now. I bet some of you thought I would forget about this blog by now. I dip in and out and I seem to never quite commit. Well, well, well, I’ll have you all know that The Book Raven is back. Ohh, and 2023 is going to be my most productive, fun filled, and insane year yet!
A year of early mornings to stream as StarsWolfe on Twitch and daily writing and posting on here in the nights. That’s right. I will be writing in 2023. I will also be reading and reviewing books in 2023.
I’m very excited to announce I have created a VTuber model for streaming and I’ve figured out how to set it up so that I can use my model and stream from my PlayStation at the same time. I can’t wait for you guys to meet her.
January is going to be me figuring out a new balance with streaming, reading, schooling, and writing. It’s going to be a whole new year with a whole new me to go along with it. I can’t wait to see what comes.
2023 is going to be packed to the brim in so many ways. Surprises and new beginnings galore. Thank you all for deciding to join me on my journey. Happy New Year!
THANK YOU ALL FOR READING! Let me know your thoughts down in the comments below!
There’s something about the beginning of the month that makes me feel like I can start over. That I can decide to focus on making my life the way I want it to be. That past two years or so that feeling has been few and far in between. I’ve been doing my best behind the scenes for a long time. Quietly rebuilding and focusing on my mental health. I feel for the first time in a long time that I have the tools in me to reestablish myself and rebuild this blog into what it’ll become from now on.
I have been irreversibly changed in the past few years. Lost and found myself multiple times. Dealt with some of the most harrowing and painful things I’ve had to deal with in my life. Through it all, I’ve quietly focused and rebuilt on my joy and my ability to rest and recover. During the past few years I did not have the bandwidth to give of myself much more then I was giving to my work, family, and friends. I understand that now. I am not upset anymore that I wasn’t able to return here during that time. A lot of it had to do with my relationship with my anxieties and my fear.
Even now, I know that eventually one of the saddest moments of my life is coming. However, I cannot keep myself from doing the things I love to do in the meantime and after that point. My time away from blogging has been valuable. I am not the same girl I was when I started the book raven. I have grown. I have established a very loving and understanding partnership with a person who has been unconditionally supportive of me and my dreams and I to them. I have picked up the pieces over and over again dealing with the reality of my dads terminal illness. I have allowed myself to give myself the space I needed to breath and to rediscover and rebuild myself from a point in my life where I felt so lost.
I am now focused on moving forward. On creating. On balancing the hardships of life with the precious joyous moments I can cherish. In this moment I can feel it in my heart that this is the best way forward. To balance living, work, and doing things that impassion me. Only a week ago I had started to dance to music again. To feel that blissful freedom of movement.
I am a woman who has been remade and renewed. It is time for me to once again shine in the new ways that I desire to. I am planning so much to share with you all. In writing, in books, in the world of video games. I am ready. I hope you all are ready to join me. It’s going to be a whole new world.
THANK YOU ALL FOR READING! Let me know your thoughts down in the comments below!
After way too much time, I have returned to set my goals for July 2022. I remembered that I had the most success in my goals when I’d write them down here and remind myself of them every day. Consistent progress that would lead to me actually finishing the projects I would set out for myself.
For reading I am going to restart Beyond the Surface. This time it’ll only be up on my blog and the main focus would be for me to read a book every month featuring a character dealing with their mental health.
For July, I will be reading The Art of Starving by Sam J. Miller.
I have chosen this book for this month because I have been desiring to read it for so long and I no longer want to make any excuses for not reading it.
I will also be reviewing the books that I’ve read this year that I have put off reviewing. I’ve been so behind in my reading and reviews that I feel super bad for accumulating such a large back log. It’s time to slowly chip away at it and not accumulate any more books till I have a lot of what I already have read.
In writing, I really want to finish an actual book. I’ve also put that off time and time and time again. It needs to be done. I really don’t care about a specific word count daily this time around, but I need to put something towards my book till it gets done.
The other daily thing is I need to start to exercise and I also don’t care if it starts at 10 minutes a day, but I need to move my body. I need to lose some weight and I miss fitting into a lot of my old clothes. Most of all I want to do some awesome cosplays and I need to loose a bit of weight and get in shape for that. The added bonus of being and feeling healthier will be amazing too.
Starting July 6th, I have the next two classes in my pharmacy technician course. I’m starting to get into more specific pharmacy tech classes and I am excited. I need to organize my classes a bit better so that I balance it to where I get everything done.
Another super exciting thing is that I got myself a ps5 a few months ago. I also took very big advantages of the PlayStation sales that have gone on. I’ve purchased a ton of really awesome games and I’ve been loving many of them. However, I haven’t really been doing a lot of completing any of these games. So my goal for this month is to work towards completing Dark Souls.
So far I have played 25 hours of dark souls. I have made it 8% of the way through the achievements. I am currently trying to make my way through blight town. My goal this month is not to complete dark souls, but at the very least to make any amount of progress on it daily provided I’ve completed all my other tasks for the day.
Also Man of Medan is coming to PlayStation plus in July and I am absolutely going to get my boyfriends to play through the entire game with me. I haven’t played a game with him in a good while and I’m excited to experience something new with him.
Also the main thing I want to do is organize my time better. I want to have nights available for myself to relax watch Stranger Things (my sole tv show to complete goal for the month) or to play video games without worrying that I have all these other things to do and complete for the day.
I also will have a decent amount of days this month set aside for family and friends. These days are the days that are the most peaceful to me.
All in all, there’s a lot I want to do in July. I will make sure I keep the main things I want to complete done and as long as I do, this month will be a success. If I do achieve all my goals this month I’ll let myself buy the game Stray to play next month because I’ve been so excited since it was announced.
THANK YOU ALL FOR READING! Let me know your thoughts down in the comments below!
The Book Raven 