Hey bookworm friends. Welcome to Dark Shelf of Wonders! You can call me Veros (She/Her). You can also call me booklover, metalhead, board game enthusiast, and craft dabbler.
My most read genres are fantasy and sci-fi but I also love a good mystery and the occasional historical fiction. I’ve been posting my book reviews on Instagram for a couple of years but I’m hoping Dark Shelf of Wonders Blog can be a slightly fancier home for my bookish ramblings.
Fun Fact: My blog name is a bookish play on words on the song “Dark Chest of Wonders” by the Finnish Symphonic Metal band Nightwish.
Some of my areas of interest are:
- Ancient & Medieval History
- Mythology
- Nature and the Environment
- Fashion History
- Petting my dog, Cheeto
Rating Scheme
Ever since I started writing book reviews, I’ve been back and forth on different rating schemes. In my old posts you might see a couple different ones, the CAWPILE system being among them. But I found it was way too much work to maintain for every book I read. In the end, I decided to just go back to simple star rating—1 to 5 including half and quarter ratings. Since no matter what system I pick, my personal rating will always be subjective, might as well keep it simple and let the review itself do the talking.
Also, I am a big advocate for DNF-ing, life is too short to read books that are not a good fit for you. Therefore you probably won’t see too many books with excessively low ratings; I don’t write reviews of DNFs nor do I rate them on any review sites. That being said, sometimes there are surprises or I read outside my comfort zone and it doesn’t work out. In that case, I believe that giving my honest opinion is helpful. Negative reviews can help connect readers with their books just as much as positive ones!
