Author: Cora Lee

Cora Lee is a National Bestselling author of Regency romance. She went on a twelve year expedition through the blackboard jungle as a high school math teacher before publishing Save the Last Dance for Me, the first book in the Maitland Maidens series. She then followed it up with six other novels and novellas ranging from sweet and traditional to spicy and suspenseful. When she’s not walking Rotten Row at the fashionable hour or attending the entertainments of the Season, you might find her participating in Regency Fiction Writers events, wading through her towering TBR pile, or eagerly awaiting the next Marvel movie release. If you’d like to find out more about Cora or her books you can sign up for her newsletter, or connect with her on Facebook, BlueSky, Bookbub, or Goodreads.
Books, TBR Challenge

Cora’s TBR check-In

Cora Lee

Three quarters of the year has passed us by, fellow readers. Are you three-quarters of the way to your reading goal?

I, as has become the norm this year, am not. I have begun reading more since Scandalous was published, but the books I’ve chosen are mainly research books for my next novel. That’s enormously fun, but it doesn’t make my TBR pile any smaller. I’ll have to re-focus for October. I have managed to curb my one-clicking a bit this month, though, and that makes me feel better. I may not be reading my older books as much as I’d like, but at least I didn’t make the problem too much worse this month 🙂

My brain has been warring a bit over reading my recent purchases versus reading TBR books, too, so I’ve spent a fair amount of time scrolling through the pages of my e-reader just trying to decide which book to read. I need a new system for choosing or I’ll spend the rest of the year just swiping through the ever-growing list!

Photo credit: ginnerobot via Flickr
Books, TBR Challenge

Cora’s TBR Challenge Check-In

Cora Lee

Happy almost-September, fellow readers! We’re three-quarters of the way through the year already! Are you going to make your TBR goal?

We have seventeen weeks left (plus the rest of this one), so I’m still in the hunt. I took a two-week break after I finished writing The Good, The Bad, And The Scandalous and didn’t do any writing at all. I’ve just been reading and trying to whittle down my Netflix queue 🙂  I’m up to five TBR books read now, and I have 16 to go in order to meet my goal. That’s totally do-able, as long as the Migraine Monster stays away and I don’t fall down too many research rabbit holes working on my next book.

I also started to organize my TBR books a little better this week. I got out good old Excel and made a spreadsheet of all the books I had that belonged to a series. I discovered that I have eight complete series on my Kindle that I haven’t even started reading, and several others that are nearly complete. Yikes! I suspect there are more, too–I haven’t quite made it through my whole collection yet–so that’s probably what I’ll focus on next. Perhaps I’ll be binge-reading over Labor Day weekend rather than binge-watching!

Photo credit: ginnerobot via Flickr
Books, TBR Challenge

Cora’s TBR Challenge Check-In

Cora Lee

Seven months down, readers. How much progress have you made on your TBR Challenge?

I’ve been a bad reader so far this year, and have made zero progress on my TBR goal. I’m still stuck at 1 TBR book read, while my Purchased In 2017 shelf has grown to 36! Oops 🙂

I’m at Romance Writers of America’s national conference this week learning, all kinds of good stuff about the business and craft of writing romance. And I’m finishing up The Good, The Bad, And The Scandalous (which releases August 17!). Once those two items are checked off my list, I’m going to spend a couple of weeks reading and binge-watching all the movies I’ve missed this year. Then perhaps my TBR Challenge total will be a bit higher…and I’ll finally get to see Wonder Woman!

Books, TBR Challenge

Cora’s TBR Challenge Check-In

Cora Lee

Happy April, fellow readers! We’re well into Spring in the Northern Hemisphere and Fall in the Southern Hemisphere. Have you been working on your TBR Challenge or spending time outside?

Knowing the end of the month was coming up spurred me to pick up a TBR book–The Hanover Square Affair by Ashley Gardner (also known as Jennifer Ashley), a Regency mystery novel in a bundle I picked up four years ago–but, as is becoming my habit, I didn’t read much the rest of the month. I’ve been writing a fair amount, getting my summer releases ready to go. I’m also in the process of getting a dog, so most of my free time the past few weeks has been devoted to back-and-forth-ing with a couple of rescues in the area. There’s good news on that front, though–Max, a German Shepherd mix, is coming home to me this weekend 😀

My book-buying habits haven’t slowed, though. It seems I picked up four more books this month, bringing my bought-in-2017 total to 25. Twenty-five books in just four months! And here I thought I’d been holding myself back this year. Max’s foster mom says that he likes to hang around the house with his person, so maybe he and I will spend more of May reading…and less time purchasing 😉

Books, TBR Challenge

Cora’s TBR Challenge Check-In

Cora Lee

We’re nearly through the first quarter of the year, fellow readers! How is your TBR reading going?

Once my RITA scores were turned in (you can click here to see the finalists in each category if you’re interested) I took a break from reading for a couple of weeks. It was only the other day I picked up a book again to read for pleasure, and it hasn’t been in my possession long enough to qualify for this challenge. So officially that makes March another month where I didn’t gain any ground. And I’m up to 21 books purchased since January 1, so I’m actually losing ground!

I’m not too worried, though. The bulk of my time has been spent writing–I have a short story and a novel coming out with a fantastic group of authors in July. As soon as those are done and released, I plan to read and read and read 🙂

Books, TBR Challenge

Cora’s TBR Challenge Check-In

Cora Lee

Two months down and ten to go! Are you making progress toward your TBR Challenge goal? I haven’t, actually. I’m judging books that have been entered in Romance Writers of America’s RITA Awards, so I’ve been reading those all month…and that’s all I’m allowed to say about them 🙂 My scores are due in this week, so I’ll be back to my old reading habits in just a few days and have more to report for March.

I can talk about the addition of my Bought In 2017 shelf on Goodreads. So far this year I’ve purchased fourteen books, and all but one are e-books that were on sale. That doesn’t really tell me anything new–I was already aware of my penchant for good deals, and e-books drop in price much more often than print books do. But it did startle me a bit to see that number glaring back at me from my Goodreads page. I’ve purchased fourteen books in just two months! No wonder my TBR pile is more of a mountain range 😀

Six RITA statues, courtesy of Barbara Samuel via flickr
Six RITA statues, courtesy of Barbara Samuel via flickr
Books, TBR Challenge

Cora’s TBR Challenge Check-In

Cora Lee

One month down, fellow readers! Have you had a good start to your TBR Challenge?

I got off to a good start with Caroline Dunford’s A Death in the Family, the first in her Euphemia Martins mystery series, which I’d had on my Kindle for a couple of years. Then I picked Historical Whodunits out of one of my bins,an anthology of historical detective stories from Ancient Egypt all the way up through the Victorian era. Historical fiction and mysteries are two of my favorite genres, so I’m really looking forward to this one.

Then my RITA books came! I’m judging for the RITA awards this year (the Oscars of the romance genre), and my packet of books appeared on my doorstep last week. I can’t say anything about them, or even acknowledge that I read them until after the awards ceremony in late July. I have to have my scores in by March 7, so my Goodreads totals are going to look rather sad for a while, but I’m going to try to sneak in a TBR book among the RITA entrants next month 🙂

Photo credit: ginnerobot via Flickr
Photo credit: ginnerobot via Flickr