Hello bookish friends and welcome to the social highlight of the year (🤔 if I keep saying it, it must be true, right?!), the #R3COMM3ND3D2022 after show party! The annual-ish recap of everything #R3COMM3ND3D where we get to gaze fondly upon the books that were chosen by twenty-nine brilliant bookish types (plus me) and announce the winner or…*audible gasp*…winners!

Of course, if you’re new to the blog you may be wondering what #R3COMM3ND3D is, so allow me to explain. It’s about sharing the book love. It’s a chance for authors, book bloggers and bookstagrammers to shout about three (yes, *only* three) books they love. They can be written by any author, in any genre and published in any way (traditionally, indie press or self-published). But there is a catch. All three books must have been published in 2022.

Waaaaaay back at the start of November book blogger Lorna of On The Shelf Reviews kicked things off for us with three cracking recommendations. By the time the feature finished on 30th November thirty days had passed and twenty-nine brilliant bookish folk (plus me) had recommended the grand total of 86 books. Eighty-six recommendations is pretty epic, right? Particularly as this year’s #R3C was a shortened, mini version.

So, let’s gaze upon the beautiful #R3COMM3ND3D2022 covers in all their splendiferous glory. Aren’t they gorgeous?!

A thing of beauty, I’m sure you’ll agree! If you took part in #R3COMM3ND3D2022 and the books you chose aren’t here then please get in touch.

You can read all of the individual posts by clicking HERE and scrolling down to 2022 or, if the thought of scrolling feels like a lot of effort, click HERE instead.

But let’s talk winners and find out what the most #R3COMM3ND3D book, or books, of 2022 were. A combination of a much shorter #R3C and the high quality of reading material published this year meant that there wasn’t a lot of opportunity for one book to rise above the rest. So 2022’s most #R3COMM3ND3D book is actually FOUR books! I give you our #R3COMM3ND3D2022 winners – the most recommended books of the year!

🏆 Huge congratulations to The Girl from Guernica by Karen Robards (MIRA), Nothing Else by Louise Beech (Orenda Books), Love and Other Human Errors by Bethany Clift (Hodder & Stoughton) and WAKE by Shelley Burr (Hodder & Stoughton) 🏆

Four very deserving titles which I hope you’ll keep an eye out for and add to your reading list at the first opportunity. One of these beauties I’ve read, the other three are going straight on the TBR. Have you read any of these cracking novels? What about the other #R3COMM3ND3D2022 books? How many do you have on your TBR? Let me know in the comments!

#R3COMM3ND3D will return next year in the form of #R3COMM3ND3D2023 (🤩) and you can help influence how it will run! If you’ve taken part in #R3COMM3ND3D since it began in 2017 and have 20 seconds to spare, please complete this survey (it’s so short, blink and you’ll miss it!): https://forms.gle/gBCgTVVwwhtLmQ4q7

The biggest of thanks to all of the book bloggers, bookstagrammers and authors who took part in #R3COMM3ND3D2022 and whittled their favourite reads down to three (an impossible task, I know!). Thank you for all of the likes, retweets, shares and comments – every single one is always appreciated. And enormous thanks to everyone who has filled in the survey so far (all six of you 😂). I’m hugely grateful for your feedback and the incredibly kind comments about the feature (although there is NO pressure to add a comment – you can skip that bit if you’re in a hurry).

Your support means everything to me and I’ll be forever grateful for the love a crazy idea I had six years ago has received from the book community. Book people really are THE BEST PEOPLE! 💜💜💜

Now’s let paaaarrrrtttttty!