The Book Lovers Journal By Stationery Geek | The Best Diary To Record And Organise Your Reading

***This is a gifted post but all thoughts are my own***

I’m a massive book lover, and like many other book lovers I’m also seriously obsessed with stationery. So when Stationery Geek got in touch about receiving one of their Book Lovers Journals in return for a review I jumped at the chance!

Stationery Geek

Stationery Geek came about through our own love of stationery, we are a design and print company based in York called Exactis Interactive Print, and Stationery Geek is our little baby!Our team consists of Lucy (the crochet and yarn fanatic), Geri (the amazing illustrator), Olly (the super efficient lego crazy one) and Mel, (the new girl!).
We have always loved the idea of designing and printing very bespoke products that can be purchased “off the shelf” so we started with My Diet Diary, then the Crochet book was born and so on and so forth.We have a growing pile of products that we have developed in house, but we also design and print “on demand” – meaning that if you have an idea of what you’d like we can take your brief and make it a reality for you! Just email us your idea!As well as all of our notebooks and pads and whatnot, we also do the “essentials” like business cards, letterheads, posters….. anything you need really! We do everything ourselves under one roof so we can maintain very competitive prices, and our speciality is a fast and efficient turnaround.
(Taken from Stationery Geek’s website)

My Review

I’ve been using the Book Lovers Journal for a couple of months now and it’s been a great tool both as a book blogger and just as a general reader, giving you the ability to really organise your reading and record a review for each completed book. It’s got a simple but very attractive cover using a selection of different colours and it’s a nice A5 size which makes it perfect for carrying around with you should you need to. The journal is ring-bound which I really appreciated, as this made it very easy to write in.

The journal contains several different sections, starting off with a list of many different genres spread out over the page. I wasn’t quite sure how to fill this bit in so used symbols to rank how I feel about each one. Despite the ambiguity I quite liked this page as it could encourage the user to explore genres they have avoided in the past.

The next two sections are really useful – a wish list (essentially a TBR) which is spread out over two pages, and a further four pages where you can list your favourite authors, plus a selection of books that they have written. The wish list is a great way to record your TBR – I use Goodreads quite religiously already but it was nice to be able to record them by hand for a change. You can tick off when you’ve read them, so this will motivate me to actually go out and buy the books to read (instead of doing what I usually do – adding even more books to the list!).

I also really liked the favourite authors section – in a way this also doubles up as a TBR as there is a checklist for each author. Filling this in was quite handy as it introduced me to books by my favourite authors that I haven’t read yet. There’s loads of space in this section and I’ve still got a page left to fill in.

The rest of the book contains spaces to write down the books you are currently reading and what you thought of them. Each section allows you to note down the title, author, genre, and reading format, plus your favourite quote and any notes you wish to make. Once you’ve read it you can make a note of the date that you completed it, plus a star rating and your overall verdict (thumbs up or thumbs down). I felt the star rating and overall verdict crossed over a tad so perhaps only one of those was needed, but I loved that you could record the format of the book – hard copy, digital, or audiobook – and that there was a space for notes… Very useful for book blogging as I always forget to write down my thoughts whilst reading! I didn’t use the favourite quotes section as much as I would have liked, but that’s down to me forgetting about it until I’d finished the book.

• 

• 

I’m not sure how many books the journal allows you to review but there’s a lot – four entries per double page spread and countless amounts of pages. Good news for those of you that get through loads of books as the Book Lovers Journal should last for quite some time! I’m reading more than I ever have before yet I think this book will last me well over a year… Possibly even more.

The only thing I would have liked to have seen added is perhaps something around a reading challenge, as I know how obsessed us book bloggers and readers get about our reading challenges! A space at the end of the journal for this would be really cool, perhaps quite vague so the user could design their own challenge – books to include, themes/genres, length of time, and so on. Reading challenges are the thing that motivate me to read the most (I’m currently doing a 2019 one with Goodreads) so I’d absolutely love something like this.

Final Thoughts

I’m really good at starting up journals and then forgetting about them after a couple of weeks (it’s somewhat of a talent), but I haven’t done this with the Book Lovers Journal which is a good sign! It’s something I didn’t realise I needed, but now I have it I absolutely love it. I’d really recommend any reading fanatics or book bloggers look into getting one, as it’s been a real asset to my reviews and has encouraged me to get more mentally organised with my ARCs.

It’s also worth checking out the other products that Stationery Geek offer as they have a fantastic range – I’m particularly keen to try out the Bloggers Bible and also one of their exciting mystery boxes!

Purchase Links

If you’d like to purchase your own Book Lovers Journal or any other of their amazing stationery products then you can do so on their website.

What do you use to keep track of your reading achievements? Let me know in the comments, and don’t forget to like and pin!
You can read some of my latest book reviews here:

Dear Edward – Ana Napolitano
KAEROU: Time To Go Home – B. Jeanne Shibahara
At The Narrow Waist Of The World – Marlena Maduro Baraf