The Firsts of 2023 Book Tag

This tag was created by Girlxoxo back in 2021. I saw this at A Literary Escape last week, and my first thought was: I need a fast post to make sure I have something to fill my days afk next week. My second thought was that it looked like a fun tag to do. But let’s be real for a second, the first was more important–I had to do extra posts last week to prep, so fast was good. So…here we go:

First Book Read This Year

Harvested by Troy Lambert

This starts with our Seattle PI looking into a dog-napping ring and ends up (as you might expect) putting him in the middle of something much, much, bigger.
(my original post about the book)

First Book Reviewed

I really don’t like calling my posts reviews, but for the sake of this tag, I’ll swallow that. I’m a little fuzzy about what they’re asking for, was that the first review of the year? Or was it the first book from this year that I reviewed? Eh…I’ll do both, just because.

The first book I posted about this year was:

Everything’s Changing by Chelsea Stickle

A strange and compelling collection of flash fiction that gave me something unexpected in each piece, featuring some really impressive and disturbing (and disturbingly impressive and imporessively disturbing) prose.
(my original post about the book)

The first book I posted about that I read this year was:

Triptych by by Karin Slaughter

I’ll talk about this down below.

First Book By A Debut Author

Haven by Ceril N Domace

Domance wasn’t a debut author by the time I read this, but this was her debut. This is a SF book with a layer of Fantasy on top of it–with a healthy dose of Family Drama added to the mix. It’s definitely worth taking a look at.
(my original post about the book)

First Book By A New-To-Me Author

Harvested by Troy Lambert

By the end of the month, I will have read three by books Lambert. By the end of the year, it could be four or more. So it looks like our first meeting went well.
(my original post about the book)

First Book That Slayed Me

The Perception of Dolls by Anthony Croix, Edited by Russell Day

Slayed me. Haunted me. Took up residence in a dark corner of my subconscious and tweaked a couple of lurking anxieties.
(my original, and insufficient, post about the book)

First Book That I Wish I Could Get Back The Time I Spent Reading It

Triptych by by Karin Slaughter

This first book featuring Will Trent really didn’t impress me–I almost returned it to the library at least 8 times while listening (it was also my first audiobook of the year). My curiousity about one character was satisfied by the end, I didn’t hate the way things wrapped up, and I’ve considered trying one more book in the series. But it was a bad experience for me.
(my original post about the book)

As usual, I’m not tagging anyone in this—but hey, join in the fun!