Stacking the Shelves & blogging update

Stacking the Shelves is a weekly meme hosted by Tynga's Reviews to showcase books we got during the past week, no matter how or what format they came in.


I bought:

Onyx, by Jennifer L. Armentrout
The Iron Queen (Iron Fey #3), by Julie Kagawa

The little key necklace you can see in the upper part of the picture is a very pretty piece of jewelry I won in a giveaway by A.G. Howard, the author of Splintered. Can't wait to finally read her book in January!


Furthermore, I got a free downlaod access to Ali Cross' first two books in the Desolation series because I voted for the title of the third book and was among the majority who chose 'Destined'.

Here are the first two books, click the covers to get to goodreads:




I also got my first review request! Check it out below:

 
She’s a halfbreed in hiding.

Rainbird never belonged. To one race, she’s chattel. To the other, she’s an abomination that should never have existed.

She lives on the sunway.

High above the ground, Rainbird is safe, as long as she does her job, keeps her head down, and never ever draws attention to herself.

But one act of sabotage is about to change everything.
For Rainbird. And for her world.





I love the cover! Her dancer's pose, high up in the night sky. Also, someone approached me to review a book! Not the other way around! I know many bloggers get dozens of review requests every week or so but this is a first for me, and the email exchange was a very positive one. I recently heard about all the terrible ways some bloggers get requested to review books (e.g. on twitter, facebook, generalized emails without sufficient info etc) and I'm glad it wasn't this way! I'm excited to read the book once I'm done with one or two NetGalley titles. It sounds very promising and like it could be a 'me' book.


Blogging update:
This is a confession of shame. Yes, I haven't been very active. I think this marks the second week of almost meme-only posts and no reviews, and I don't like it at all. I want to have actual content on the blog. But I've just been feeling very very drained - I do just enough to keep up with universtiy coursework. I've had a lot going on, and I just had a kind of review writing block. I also haven't written on my NaNo novel since Sunday. It all just feels wrong and I'm very discontent with how things are going. I've been pretty much off twitter, too. I've had little energy and motivation to write anything, but I think I'm past the worst part. I hope I can finally write my review for The Shadow Society tomorrow. It's not that I was in a reading slump (I don't think that has ever happened to me) but I just couldn't get my thoughts straight and into review mode. I really hope I can turn this around in the coming week!
If any of you have tips on this problem that they can share, ways to get motivated again... bring them on! I'd really appreciate it!

Otherwise, let me know what you think of my haul & link up your own in the comments :)