Tag: 30 Interesting Questions

I’ve never seen this tag before, so I just wanted to send a big thank you to Florence @ Miscellany Pages for tagging me!


1. What are your nicknames? What do you prefer to be called?

You know, I don’t really have any nicknames! Everybody in my life just calls me Sara. Except, I guess, my manager, who calls me Sarabella.

2. How often do you doodle? What do your doodles look like?

I doodle a lot when I’m on hold at work. I usually doodle hearts or stars or just squiggly lines.

3. What do you do if you can’t sleep at night? Do you count sheep? Toss and turn? Try to get up and do something productive?

I often can’t sleep at night. I either try to think of absolutely nothing or I imagine really wild scenarios until I’ve exhausted my brain enough to get some sleep.

4. Do people consider you to be talkative or quiet?

I’m pretty talkative with people that I like. I’m very quiet with people I don’t know.

5. What makes you cry?

I’m not really a big crier, but one thing that always makes me cry is someone repeatedly asking if I’m okay. I also tend to cry when I feel any kind of emotion really strongly.

6. What is your biggest pet peeve?

I get really upset when people don’t understand the impact that they have on others and on the world. It can be big things like being really wasteful or it can be little things like blocking the grocery store aisle with their cart while they take a phone call. I just think a little self-awareness goes a long way.

7. How many times a day do you look at yourself in the mirror?

I don’t go out of my way to look at myself in the mirror. I’ll make sure I’m presentable whenever I’m in the bathroom, but that’s about it.

8. What is the strangest thing you believed as a child?

There was a little path next to my childhood home where the ground dipped down a little bit and I was convinced I’d fall through to the other side of the world if I stepped on it.

9. What is the guilty pleasure you enjoy too much to give up?

I don’t believe in guilty pleasures! The only thing I do that could maybe be considered a guilty pleasure is scrolling through really expensive house listings and making snarky comments. I like finding the most expensive house for sale (around here, this is usually at least a $5 million house) and finding all of the weird design choices. There was one listing I looked at that had an indoor pool (fancy!) and a formal dining area so close to it that if you stood up too fast, you’d probably fall backwards into the water.

10. Who performs the most random acts of kindness out of everyone you know?

Stealing Florence’s answer here… probably my mom.

11. How often do you read the newspaper? Which sections?

I read the weekly newspaper from my town every Thursday. I read most of it aside from the sports section. If I don’t have a ton of time, I always check the police blotter, the books section (shocking!), the event calendar, and the obituaries. I also love looking through the houses for sale. This is such a fancy area and the kind of houses around here always shock me.

12. Which animal scares you the most?

I love animals and I’m not really scared of any of them. I guess I wouldn’t really want to run into a bear in the wild, though.

13. Are you more likely to avoid conflict or engage with it?

AVOID. I am the most conflict-averse person you’ll ever meet. I dodge any conflict that I can.

14. What is the most recent compliment you’ve received?

Um… my mom told me that she’s proud of me today. I guess that counts? I can’t really think of anything more specific than that.

15. What question are you tired of hearing?

This is professionally, not personally: “Why are you billing me? I have insurance!”

I get this question at least ten times a day and the answer is that I’m billing you because your insurance company told me to. Your plan details are usually on the front of your insurance card. If not, you can (and should) call your insurance company and request detailed information on your benefits so that you’re not surprised when you see a doctor.

16. What is the strangest thing you have eaten?

Probably llama heart when I was in Peru.

17. Do you have a whole lot of acquaintances or just a few very close friends?

I have a ton of acquaintances! So many!!! I work in a medical office and sometimes I feel like I’m on a first name basis with the entire town. I can’t go anywhere without seeing someone I know. But I literally only have like three people that I’d consider friends.

18. Do you have a catchphrase?

Probably “ooh, fancy” or “oh dear.”

19. What’s your all-time favourite town or city? Why?

Madison, WI. It’s where I went to college and I have such great memories there. There are so many places to go and so many things to do.

20. If you had to change your first name, what would you change it to?

I can hardly decide what I want to have for dinner. I don’t think I can make this decision. My future husband is going to need to name all the children.

21. When was the last time you lied?

I really try not to lie because it makes me so, so angry when people lie to me. Instead of lying, I’ll usually just dodge the question. I legitimately can’t even think of the last time I lied.

22. What’s something that amazes you?

I think I’ve said this before, but I’m amazed by anyone who can pull an entire book out of their head.

23. Would you rather be the first person to explore a planet or be the inventor of a drug that cures a deadly disease?

I’d definitely want to cure a deadly disease.

24. What is your favourite amateur activity?

Probably baking! I love baking so much.

25. What was your first thought when you got up this morning?

I scheduled this post a little bit in advance, so you’re actually getting my thought from the morning of March 9. That thought was “I hope [my boyfriend]’s plane landed safely.”

26. What is your favourite song (at least at the moment)?

That’s a tough one, but probably Sight of You by Sigrid.

27. List someone you know and describe them in five words.

My best friend is a quirky, hilarious, hard-working, short bookworm.

28. You can select one person from history and have them truthfully answer one question. Who would you select and what would the question be?

Remember how I said a little bit ago that I can’t make decisions? This is one of those decisions I can’t make. I actually have no idea.

29. Which celebrity or artist do you resemble the most?

I don’t think I particularly look like any celebrities, but there’s one patient who yells, “Hey, Blacklist girl!!” every time he comes in because he thinks I look like Megan Boone.

30. What do you want me to know?

That this Instagram account exists.


I’m tagging: Caidyn | Lori | Trisha | Gerry | Raya


Please feel free to do this tag even if I didn’t tag you! Do you have a catchphrase? Are you more talkative or quiet? What’s the strangest thing you’ve eaten? Let’s talk in the comments!

Find me all over the internet: Goodreads | Twitter | Bloglovin’

ARC review: The Dating Game by Kiley Roache

The Dating Game by Kiley Roache
Rating: ★★☆☆☆
Links: Amazon • TBD • Goodreads
Publication Date: March 26, 2019
Source: ARC via Netgalley

The Social Network gets a romantic twist in this fresh and engaging new read from the author of Frat Girl, Kiley Roache. Experience the whirlwind ups and downs of college life in this authentic and entertaining new novel!

When a notoriously difficult class for future entrepreneurs leads to three freshmen developing the next “it” app for dating on college campuses, all hell breaks loose…

Type A control freak Sara lives by her color-coordinated Post-it notes.

Rich boy Braden wants out from under his billionaire father’s thumb.

Scholarship student Roberto can’t afford for his grades to drop.

When the three are forced to work together in one of the university’s most difficult classes, tension rises to the breaking point…until, shockingly, the silly dating app they create proves to be the most viable project in class. Late nights of app development, interest from investors and unexpected romance are woven into a true-to-life college drama that explores what it means to really connect online and IRL.

I was really excited when I saw that Kiley Roache’s new novel was available on Netgalley. I really enjoyed her debut, Frat Girl, when I read it last year and had been looking forward to reading more from her. One of the things that I most enjoyed about Frat Girl was the way that it addressed real college issues and stereotypes while still being a really entertaining book with a great message. My hopes for The Dating Game were pretty high — made even higher, possibly, by the fact that it features a main character named Sara who loves color-coordinated Post-It notes (actually me) — but unfortunately, it didn’t work for me.

I think the biggest problem that I had with this book was how unfinished it felt. The idea of the plot is good. I love the concept of a bunch of college kids struggling to come up with an idea for their class and accidentally creating a really popular app. It’s a really fun idea and I think it could have been a really fun book. But it wasn’t.

The thing is, the app is just disgusting. It’s an app like Tinder, but you get graded for your ratio of left vs. right swipes, and you get penalized if someone you match with unmatches with you. This predictably causes a bit of drama on this college campus and quickly turns into girls crying on the sidewalk because their ranking dropped when their boyfriend broke up with them. And not only is the whole idea of the app disgusting, but you should hear their ideas for advertising! “Oh, when someone’s rating starts dropping, we’ll show them ads for gym memberships and makeup.” REALLY? This isn’t even challenged.

There’s also what I’m assuming is supposed to be a big plot twist toward the end that’s just… forgive me for saying this… bad. It doesn’t make sense. It would never happen in the real world. I mean, granted, most of what happens in this book would never happen in the real world. I wish I could give some spoilers here, but this is an ARC review, so I’m trying very hard not to do that.

So, I think I’ve established that the plot is a little questionable. There were also so many mistakes! Some mistakes are to be expected in an ARC, but this was just beyond what’s normal. I’m talking about names being changed in the middle of a scene. Personalities changing. A character that wasn’t even present in a scene suddenly saying something. Typos and word usage problems. This is not what I expect from a publisher like Harlequin.

I also want to mention something that kind of bothered me every time I saw it, and that was Instafriend. At one point, a character mentions scrolling mindlessly through the blue and white screen of Instafriend. I think it’s pretty clear that they’re referring to a fictionalized Facebook. And that’s fine! Except that a few chapters later, Facebook is a thing. But so is Instafriend? It was just odd.

Now, with all of that said, you’re probably wondering why I gave this book two stars instead of one star when I so clearly disliked it. The reason is that I could hardly put it down! It’s a very readable book and if I didn’t have to do things like sleep in order to be a functional adult, I probably could have finished it in one night.

I have hopes that the finished version of this book will have gone through some rigorous edits to correct a lot of the issues I had with it. I can’t really recommend it, but I would be really interested in hearing from anyone who reads the final, published version.


#killingthetbr: four months on shelf


Have you read The Dating Game? Is it on your TBR?
Let’s talk in the comments!

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