Six Year Blogoversary // The Best of The Long Voyage

I completely missed my actual blogoversary this year. It was on June 22nd, and I had planned to get this post out a week or two after that. However, life happened and got crazy, and I wasn’t able to do as much writing as I’d hoped.

But, nevertheless, I’m here now, and if you’re up for it, I’d love to celebrate a little late with my favorite voyagers (that’s you). I honestly have no idea how this is all still happening, considering that blogging has dramatically decreased in popularity since I first started, but I’m so so grateful for each and every one of you.

You, my precious voyagers, make this all worth it. And I’m so honored that you’ve chosen to stick around for as long as you have. I absolutely adore our little community of writers, readers, and dreamers, and I can’t wait to see what this seventh year holds for us.

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The Long Voyage Stats

Places my blog has reached (views): United Stages (31,500), India (3,320), Canada (2,429), United Kingdom (2,352), Australia (2,047), Philippines (1,178), Germany (851), Malaysia (522), Indonesia (469), Netherlands (449), France (440), Singapore (422), South Africa (353), Spain (312), New Zealand (305), Brazil (296), Poland (267), Sweden (260), Italy (244), Hong Kong SAR China (218), Pakistan (212), Mexico (212), Belgium (201), Ireland (174), Austria (162), United Arab Emirates (155), China (151), Switzerland (151), Romania (150), Sri Lanka (138), Finland (137), Denmark (137), Portugal (135), Norway (135), Japan (130), Türkiye (128), Czechia (125), Nigeria (123), Argentina (121), Vietnam (120), Thailand (117), South Korea (115), Russia (114), Israel (112), Greece (106), Bangladesh (96), Serbia (92), Ukraine (83), Bulgaria (79), Hungary (76), Saudi Arabia (72), Egypt (65), Taiwan (64), Cambodia (63), Slovakia (59), Chile (56), Syria (52), Georgia (45), Peru (42), Colombia (42), Lithuania (41), Nepal (40), Puerto Rico (35), Croatia (35), Ecuador (35), Morocco (31), Qatar (29), Trinidad & Tobago (27), Latvia (27), Lebanon (24), Honduras (23), Kenya (22), Afghanistan (21), Slovenia (20), Iraq (20), Cyprus (20), Jordan (19), Estonia (19), Algeria (18), Panama (17), Albania (17), Solomon Island (16), Oman (16), Bhutan (16), Uruguay (15), Mauritius (15), Luxembourg (15), Kuwait (15), Maldives (14), Costa Rica (14), Guatemala (13), Ghana (13), Uzbekistan (12), Iceland (12), Bosnia & Herzegovina (12), Armenia (12), Paraguay (11), Jamaica (11), Jersey (11), Bolivia (11), Venezuela (10), Nicaragua (10), Kazakhstan (10), Azerbaijan (10), Zambia (9), Uganda (9), Moldova (9), American Samoa (9), North Macedonia (8), Guam (8), Dominican Republic (8), Brunei (8), French Polynesia (7), Malta (7), Ethiopia (7), Bahrain (7), Zimbabwe (6), Mongolia (6), Tunisia (5), Papua New Guinea (5), Macao SAR China (5), Myanmar (Burma) (5), Cuba (5), Belarus (5), Botswana (5), Turks & Caicos Islands (4), Suriname (4), Mozambique (4), Madagascar (4), Kyrgyzstan (4), Cameroon (4), Aruba (4), U.S. Virgin Islands (3), Namibia (3), Montenegro (3), Libya (3), Iran (3), Isle of Man (3), Guyana (3), Barbados (3), Kosovo (2), Tanzania (2), El Salvador (2), Sierra Leone (2), Réunion (2), Malawi (2), Northern Mariana Islands (2), St. Lucia (2), Gibralter (2), Guernsey (2), Fiji (2), European Union (2), Curaçao (2), Bahamas (2), Bermuda (2), Anguilla (2), Yemen (1), St. Vincent & Grenadines (1), Seychelles (1), Palau (1), Lesotho (1), Liberia (1), Cayman Islands (1), Haiti (1), Guadeloupe (1), Micronesia (1), Djibouti (1), Côte d’Ivoire (1), Congo – Brazzaville (1), Belize (1), Benin (1), Antigua & Barbuda (1), and Andorra (1).

My Most Popular Posts:

My Favorite Post(s) from this Year:

I decided to do something a little different to celebrate this year. Instead of letting you ask me questions or sharing an exclusive writing snippet, I want to look back through the archives and share some of the best posts I’ve done. These are obviously biased because it’s what I think is my best work, but you can think of it as a Long Voyage Starter Pack.

This will also serve as my proof that I have, in fact, been screaming about the same seven books for six years. But that’s totally irrelevant.

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This post came long before this blog ever existed. I grapped with this question a lot as a teenager, and it was something I first started writing about on my original, private blog that only my friends and family could follow.

It was one of my earliest attempts to answer the question, “Why do you write?” I didn’t know that this was important for marketing and motivation—all I knew was that I felt like I needed to understand why I was writing. Why I felt the need to pen my thoughts and tell stories.

So, one day, I started writing. I started exploring. And this post was the result.

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I can’t even lie—I had the time of my life writing this post. I’d been thinking about this idea for a while, and once I wrote about morally gray characters for an essay in my Shakespeare class (aptly titled, “Duty and Honor in Morally Gray Characters”), I knew that I had to turn it into a blog post.

As if that wasn’t exciting enough, this was the perfect opportunity to scream about two of my favorite morally gray characters. I’ve loved these characters for many years now (for wildly different reasons), so getting to talk about them in both a collegiate and a blog setting were fun experiences for me as a writer.

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I made this guide because I’ve struggled to find trigger warnings and content reviews online before. I know the frustration of trying and failing to find any information about a book I want to read because it seems like nobody has posted any guides.

However, over the years, I found a few go-to sites that I use routinely to check content before I buy or read a book. And I wanted to share those websites because it’s not just me who’s struggling. It’s teenagers who are growing more and more frustrated with the spice content in YA books. It’s the parents who want to let their kids read voraciously but can’t keep up with them anymore. It’s the librarians and teachers who want to recommend books, but who maybe don’t want to hand a thirteen-year-old a book with list of trigger warnings that reaches the floor.

So, this for the readers who want to consume books based on informed decisions and avoid stumbling across any awful scenes because nobody bothered to tell you.

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If you’ve been here for any length of time, then you know that You’ve Reached Sam by Dustin Thao is one of my favorite books. In fact, I’d probably say it’s in my top two favorite books of all time (I don’t think anything will ever dethrone Challenger Deep by Neal Shusterman).

But, here’s the thing: I’ve never read this book more than once. And, I think I finally realized why—I don’t want to alter my view of the book. I fell in love with this story in a season when I needed someoen to look at me and say, “I see your grief,” and You’ve Reached Sam did that for me. If I read it again and suddenly I didn’t feel the same way, I think that would make me sad.

I know that every experience we have with a story will change our view of it, but . . . I don’t know. There’s a part of me that feels like that original experience should never be altered because it was so important and fundamental to who I am now.

Maybe this is just me being a little dramatic, but regardless, I think I’ll always hold this book a little closer to my heart than even Challenger Deep (because those books did very different things for me. Not unequal things, but just different things). And, if you’re looking for book recommendations, I’d recommend this with my entire soul.

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I’ve always loved the dystopian genre. It was my biggest obsession as a teenager (that’s a lie—it was Twilight), and somehow I still always find my way back to it in the end (even though my hiatuses between them are slowly growing longer).

It might seem odd, but to me, dystopias are the truest form of grit that we have in writing. Because dystopias are where humanity shows it’s true colors. These are the stories where we learn who people really are in that moment when it suddenly hits us that we. won’t. win. And that moment—the one when reality crashes into us and crumbles around us all at once—is the one where we discover hope.

Because hope isn’t just something we cling to. It’s something we fight for. That we claw through the dirt and wrestle for, even when everyone tells us it’s impossible.

Because that is what it means to be human.

So, I wrote a guide to help you dip into the genre. I shared some of my favorite dystopias and the ones I think everyone should try at least once. And I might have categorized it so you can find the one that best fits what you’re looking for right now.

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I’ve thought for years that I would be a genius Buzzfeed article/quiz writer, so this post was my best attempt to act like I do, in fact, have this incredible job (that I absolutely don’t have in real life).

I wanted to share some of my romantic playlist songs with you all, but I still hadn’t landed on the best way to do that. So, I decided to make a cute little post with four song recommendations per type of romantic ship. In addition to each ship/song combination, I also provided a detailed description of the ideal reader for each romantic ship, so be prepared to feel seen and read like a book.

And, in case you’re wondering, I’m definitely an “In-Love-With-Someone-You-Can’t-Have” Ship kinda girl.

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This was kind of an unusual post for me because, while I’ve posted about music before, I never really made it a huge part of my brand. But something felt different about this post. People opened it. People clicked on it. Currently, it has over 900 views, which is a lot for my blog posts (considering only 161 people are subscribed).

So, I started experimenting with different music-centered posts. I shared songs that resonated with me in different seasons of my life and albums that helped me through times when I felt lost. And you all showed up. You opened my emails. You read my posts. You gave me enough hope that somebody was listening to keep showing up.

A lot of you are silent readers. You don’t like every post, and you don’t comment a lot. But I see your DMs when a post truly resonates with you. I see the views and the open rates and the clicks that prove you keep showing up.

And, while that may not be a big enough reason for other people, it’s always been enough for me.

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This post is special to me because it was the first time I ever shared major details about my WIP online. I don’t think I ever posted the title anywhere else, and it felt right to share that here, with all of you, first.

You’re my voyagers, and you’re the ones who have been here through it all. You stuck around during my unplanned hiatuses and the extended breaks while school was eating me alive or my mental health dipped and I couldn’t bring myself to write a post.

So, this post was a little like my way of saying thank you. For being here. For supporting me. For believing in what we’re building. And for choosing to be part of this beautiful community we’ve created together.

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If you know me at all, then this post wasn’t a surprise. You probably opened it up and thought, “Yep. This is incredibly Bree-coded. I can’t believe it took her this long to finally write it.”

And, if that confuses you (or you haven’t been here very long), let me explain: grief is intertwined in everything I write. It’s the foundational pillar of my storytelling, and it’s the experience that formed so much of who I am today. I didn’t set out to create a brand around grief, but it’s exactly what God knew I needed to do because it’s the one tie I have to this world that I can use to make you feel less alone.

So, I finally wrote the post: I finally shared my best advice for how to write a grief in a way that’s both realistic and resonates with your readers. It’s not a comprehensive list, but it’s a place to start or perhaps gain a new perspective.

And I hope it helps you create the story you’ve always known it could be.

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This is my non-comprehensive list of grief books that I think everyone should read. Yes, it includes You’ve Reached Sam (because I will never pass an opportunity to scream about that book), but it also includes some older, less popular books that I think capture grief in a really powerful and impactful way.

I would also say that this post is probably the closest to encapsulating my brand as a writer, an author, and a blogger. I’ve spent a lot of time over this past year trying to define and hone my brand and the brand of The Long Voyage. It’s been quite a journey, but I think it’s been a rewarding one.

Because now I understand what my readers want and what you like to see from me. I know how to serve you better and show up for you in ways that really matter.

And I’m eternally grateful that we’ve gotten to spend another year together.

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Let’s Talk!

I still can’t believe it’s been SIX YEARS. That’s literally insane to me. I didn’t really get a chance to do a proper Q&A or anything interactive this time, so if you wanna ask me questions or something, drop them in the comments down below!