February 2026
No-shame reading, tracking new releases, and a variety of reviews
Reflection: Reading Culture
Since reading isn’t only a solitary act—but very social—I think that the way we talk about reading is important. Personally, I have had to practice a journey of talking to myself well about reading, including creating a “glanced through” shelf in Goodreads so I can feel better about quitting reading books rather than “slogging through.” I want to enjoy reading rather than checking books off a hit list. I want that same awareness of how easy it is to feel shame to shape how I talk about books with other people.
During my English major, I remember jokes about “cocktail party conversation” books—ones we pretend to have read. Rather than perpetuating this stigma, I want to share books I am excited about, not ones I think will gain me street-cred.
I also try to take recommendations seriously—I realize that people have limited reading bandwidth and don’t want to cram in something that’s not a good fit. When I lend a book, I try to clarify that the recommendation should not come with guilt or stress if the book is not a good fit or not the right timing. When someone else recommends a book to me, I try to actually read it so I can discuss it with them, or at least engage with it enough to have a lively discussion articulating how it wasn’t a good fit.
Resource: Book Notification
While Goodreads supposedly has a feature to track new releases from your authors, it is buggy, doesn’t send email notifications, and you can’t remove authors you have read but didn’t enjoy.
I recently discovered Book Notification and am really intrigued by it! It is a tech tool that has a single purpose (tracking when your favorite authors come out with new books). The onboarding sequence was very helpful on how to set up my account. Its data has human vetting, and I even received personal emails helping me import my books from Goodreads and Libby.
I like the ability to choose which authors/series I want to follow and to see upcoming new releases in a calendar format, so that I know which books to request from my library!
Reviews: Mostly Theological Books
Here are a few new reviews I posted this month:
