Indulgence Insider is our version of Stacking the Shelves, Bought, Borrowed & Bagged and the Sunday Post, bringing you this week’s haul, bookish news and discussion posts from around the blogosphere!

OMG MY HEART. Aila surprised us with some amazing artwork of our co-blogging adventures! This is totally perfect and depicts me being a chirpy morning person and Jenna being a night owl! Being in Florida, Aila talks to us during all hours of the day!

I’m so excited, I have 2.5 more days until I’m officially on Christmas holidays! It’s been a pretty big year at work, and I’m keen to just kick back, relax, take a break from house hunting and read more books! It’s our 10 year anniversary with the boyfriend next week, so we’re going to a tropical island at the Whitsundays (on the Great Barrier Reef) to celebrate for a few days. I’m really looking forward to it!

On the house hunting front, we almost put in an offer for a house that we weren’t 100% happy with. We’ve decided to take a break for the rest of the month and give it a fresh start in January. Our lease runs out in February though, so we have to weigh up our options on what to do soon. I hope something comes along soon (after viewing 30 houses over the past 3 months!).

Happy Indulgence reached 1500 followers on Instagram! Thank you so much for your support! I love the bookstagram community so much, it’s just so supportive, drama free and relaxing to browse through beautiful pictures of books.

 The next Read Play Blog topic to be posted on the 16th is: What games are you looking forward to this holiday season? This is a unique meme for gamers that is posted on the 16th of every month! To participate, post your answer, recommendation & currently playing on the 16th or anytime during the month and link up!

Book Haul 

Review copies 

This Raging Light by Estelle Laure – I’ve been sent this YA contemporary from Hachette Australia three times lol! I think I’ll host some giveaways soon. Thank you!

Liquidator by Andy Mulligan – A book centred around an energy drink and a rock concert. Thank you to Scholastic Australia for sending me this!

Purchased

Chasing River by K.A. Tucker – Got a $10 voucher to spend at Big W so I bought the next in the Burying Water series, which is a NA romantic suspense series. Check out reviews for Burying Water and Becoming Rain.

Reading Update 

• Currently reading The Wrath and the Dawn which is as amazing as the raves! I love the Arabian setting and Shahrzad is fiesty and fearless.
• I really enjoyed The Martian with all of its’ heart, humour, survival and space goodness! I read this after watching the movie and it was fantastic. 4.5 stars.
• Chimera was a horrific continuation of the tapeworm zombie series, and it wrapped up nicely (but not without tense moments and hard decisions). 4 stars. Review to come.
• Lady Helen and the Dark Days Club took a rather slow start. I’ve passed this onto my co-blogger Aila because the regency era wasn’t for me, and I’ll be interviewing the author tomorrow.

Bookstagram 

On #bookstagram I’m doing the #allthebooksof2015 challenge, which lists the “best of” books for the year. Here’s some of my pics! Follow @happyindulgence to see more pics!

Bookish News

• Fierce Reads revealed redesigned covers for The Winner’s trilogy by Marie Rutkoski and we’re not happy, because apparently you can’t be kickass in a pretty dress.
• Jillian’s Books’ Blogger Positivity Campaign has come to an end, after spreading lots of wonderful posts and positivity throughout the blogosphere. Check out the wrap up here.
• Everyone likes compliments, that’s why Project Serendipity is here, to be matched up with a blogger and give them compliments!
• Download these beautiful phone graphics by the lovely Aila at her blog, One Way or An Author!

Discussion Posts

Here’s some discussion posts I enjoyed this week:

• Cait @ Paper Fury lists 10 types of characters she absolutely loves 
• Ella @ Once Upon a Bookish Time talks about the pain of being a bookworm
• Joy @ Joyous Reads offers a powerful post on ignoring the guilt that comes with reading 
• Nuzaifa @ Word Contessa lists changes in the book blogging community since she started.
• Rachel @ Istyria Book Blog is giving up ARCs 
• Keionda @ Keionda Reads talks about how blogging has changed her so far 
• Rashika @ The Social Potato does a hilarious post on why people shouldn’t read YA 
• Nereyda @ Nick and Nereyda’s Infinite Book List talks about body image and double standards when it comes to fictional men

You May Have Missed…

• I did mini reviews for 4 contemporary books, some which were interesting and others disappointing
• Jenna reviewed The Cracks in the Kingdom which turned into more of a fantasy read in the sequel 
• Aila talks about why she reads science fiction and recommends some great YA sci-fi reads 

How was your bookish week?

The post Indulgence Insider #44 – Artwork & 1500 Instagram Followers appeared first on Happy Indulgence.