Reading Resolutions: March Successes

I feel like I've been consuming books like they're vital to my life recently! I've been reading all the time, and enjoying a wide variety of books.

1. Read 200 books (at least 52,000 pages):

I read 20 books in March for a total of 65 for the year so far (what) and added another 5,000 pages bringing my page count so far to just under 19,000.

2. Read 12 non-fiction books (preferably 1/month):

I made it through 2 in March. I read Michael Rosen's Alphabetical: How Every Letter Tells a Story, which was a fascinating look at the English alphabet and at language in general. I also read Stuck in the Middle: Seventeen Comics from an Unpleasant Age edited by Ariel Schrag. This was a graphic novel compilation of autobiographical stories from middle school. It was...okay. I wasn't a huge fan, but it was an interesting read.

3. Read at least 2 print books I own each month (with an eye to weeding):

I did manage to pull this one off. I read The Agency: The Body at the Tower by Y. S. Lee, which I really enjoyed - the whole series was good and I'll be writing a review of it over on the Booksellers Without Borders blog. I also read The Ark by Boyd Morrison, which was interesting, but went into the weed pile, because it's not something I'll read again.

4. Read at least 2 eBooks I own each month:

Completed this one as well making it through L.R.W. Lee's Andy Smithson: Blast of the Dragon's Fury, The Grey Fairy Book edited by Andrew Lang, The Berenstain Bears and the G-Rex Bones by Stan and Jan Berenstain (I didn't know there were Berenstain Bear chapter books!), and Kelly Oram's Being Jamie Baker which was super fun.

5. Read at least 1 book off my GoodReads To-Read list:

I did double duty on this one with Alphabetical being both a non-fiction and a To-Read book. I also read Marion Jensen's Almost Super, which I enjoyed.

6. Read at least 2 academic articles each month:

I almost didn't get to this one, but dug up 2 on the last day of the month, determined to complete the challenge I'd set for myself. I read "'Scope for the Imagination': Imaginative Spaces and Female Agency in Anne of Green Gables" by Lauren Makrancy and "Teaching International Students How to Avoid Plagiarism: Librarians and Faculty in Collaboration" by Jenny Gunnarsson, Wlodek J. Kulesza, and Anette Pettersson

Bookish Resolutions: January Successes

I can't believe January has passed us by already! I did a ton of reading this month - just couldn't seem to stop! Excited to see what this new year will continue to bring.

So here's how I did on my bookish resolutions:

1. Read 200 books (at least 52,000 pages):
I read a whopping 26 books this month. I did read 12 graphic novels, but a couple were pretty lengthy. Counting the articles I read, I managed about 7,600 pages and since I only need about 4300 a month to make my page goal I'm off to a really good start!

2. Read 12 non-fiction books (preferably 1/month):
I read 2 this month. One was the graphic novel Annie Sullivan and the Trials of Helen Keller by Joseph Lambert, which was a fascinating look at their initial struggles to communicate and also, and to me more interestingly, a look at the plagiarism charges Helen faced which ended up effectively discouraging her from writing fiction. I also finished David S. Serchay's The Librarian's Guide to Graphic Novels for Adults, which was an interesting look at the history of comics and graphic novels and a good, if a bit outdated at this point, list of suggestions for collection development.

3. Read at least 2 print books I own each month (with an eye to weeding):
I squeaked by on this one, reading Library of Souls, the conclusion to Ransom Riggs' Peculiar Children trilogy for book club and Adam by Ted Dekker in my continuing efforts to read through alphabetically. It's kind of depressing me that I'm still in the As, so I want to make a stronger effort to read more books I own and avoid the library for the most part.

4. Read at least 2 eBooks I own each month:
Did better on this one, because I read them on my lunch breaks and can keep myself from being distracted. This month I read Andrew Lang's The Yellow Fairy Book (only 8 more fairy books to go...), Agatha Christie's The A. B. C. Murders, Above by Isla Morley (which was crazy and good), Avalon by Mindee Arnett (a YA sci-fi reminiscent of Firefly), Before Midnight by Jennifer Blackstream, Mercedes Lackey's A Tangled Web (a novella of the 500 kingdoms that I wish was much longer!), and Arena Mode by Blake Northcott. So a total of 7 eBooks for this month.

5. Read at least 1 book off my GoodReads To Read list:
These are strictly books I do not own, so these are the only books I'm going to allow myself to get from the library. Starting alphabetically I read The ACB with Honora Lee by Kate De Goldi which was sweet and wonderful and makes me happy just thinking about it again.

6. Read at least 2 academic articles each month:
I am glad I added this challenge, because it forced me to go looking for and find articles on topics I'm interested in but might not take the time to read right now. I read "Overcoming the Barriers to Information Literacy Programs: CALM Lab for English Majors at Dickinson College" by Christine Bombaro and "'The Status is Not Quo!': Pursuing Resolution in Web-Disseminated Serial Narrative" by Anouk Lang, which was a fascinating analysis of the reception of Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog.

All in all I am very proud of my progress this month and looking forward to the books I have on queue for February!

Popsugar 2015 Reading Challenge - Completed!

I stumbled across the Popsugar Reading Challenge last year and thought that it looked like a fun way to read some things I might not otherwise seek out. I didn't really plan ahead too much, filling in categories with books I was reading anyway, but also keeping these categories in mind. Toward the end of the year, though, I took a good look at the categories that were left and found books on my shelves I hadn't read before and did some serious googling to find titles for a couple of the categories that weren't easily identifiable (like a book set in my home town or a book published the year I was born). I completed it and was pretty happy with the variety of books I read because of it.

Here are the categories and the books I read to fulfill them:

• A book with more than 500 pages: The Madwoman in the Attic: The Woman Writer and the Nineteenth Century Literary Imagination by Sandra M. Gilbert & Susan Gubar - I was wokring on this for a paper I'm writing and this gave me additional impetus to finish it.
• A classic romance: Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte - I wasn't entirely sure what "classic romance" was, but I found some GoodReads chats where people were discussing what they read for this category. I'd had this book sitting on my eReader and kept meaning to get to it, and I'm so glad this challenge made me read it now because I fell in love with Anne Bronte's books.
• A book that became a movie: Coraline by Neil Gaiman - I haven't seen the movie yet, I'd been putting it off until after I read the book, and now I can watch it. I'm curious as to how they adapted this dark fairy tale.
• A book published this year: The Curiosity House: The Shrunken Head by Lauren Oliver & H.C. Chester - I had quite a few I could have picked for this category, but I really enjoyed this book, so it made the list.
• A book with a number in the title: 3:16 The Numbers of Hope by Max Lucado - Another book that had been sitting on my shelf waiting for me to read it. I'm a fan of Lucado's style.
• A book written by someone under 30: A Darker Shade of Magic by V.E. Schwab - This category was hard to track down because most authors don't advertise their age. I basically looked at books I read and started googling authors that I knew were younger until I found one with an age listed.
• A book with nonhuman characters: Squish: Brave New World by Jennifer L. Holm & Matthew Holm - Only the Holms could write such an engaging book about an amoeba. I love their writing style!
• A funny book: Not That It Matters by A.A. Milne - I love Milne's work, especially his humorous essays, so when I discovered a stack of them at the library where I work I felt like I'd hit the mother lode. These are all just so fantastic.
• A book by a female author: Thursdays with the Crown by Jessica Day George - I was a little annoyed at this category, like reading a book by a woman was a big deal or something. Pretty much just picked one of the many, many books written by a female author that I read but didn't use in any of the other categories. Also wanted to highlight this series because adorableness abounds and you should read it.
• A mystery or thriller: The Third Twin by CJ Omololu - Didn't read too many mysteries or thrillers this year, but when Omololu held a Twitter chat to promote this book and the chat was really fun and engaging and the book sounded intriguing I decided to check it out. Interesting twist on the twins switching places trope.
• A book with a one-word title: Landline by Rainbow Rowell - Enjoyed it, but this is probably my least favorite of Rowell's books.
• A book of short stories: A Medicine for Melancholy by Ray Bradbury - Bradbury's short fiction has its ups and downs for me. I really enjoy some of it and others, well, not so much. But I'm not a fan of short stories, so I was glad to find one that I found pretty entertaining.
• A book set in a different country: The Accidental Mother by Rowan Coleman - This was a cute book set in England.
• A nonfiction book: The Word of God and the Word of Man by Karl Barth - I stumbled across this while fielding a research question and became intrigued. Really liked this series of essays.
• A popular author’s first book: The Carpet People by Terry Pratchett - This was both his first book and not his first book as it was an edited and expanded version of his first book, but I counted it because it was so cute.
• A book from an author you love that you haven’t read yet: The Actor and the Housewife by Shannon Hale - So very glad I got to this one. I loved this book a lot.
• A book a friend recommended: The Nest by Kenneth Oppel - My sister really liked this book, so I was excited to read it. Also, Jon Klassen's illustrations are spot on as always.
• A Pulitzer prize winning book: March by Geraldine Brooks - This has been on my TBR list for ages, so I was glad to have a reason to finally get to it. It wasn't a favorite, but it was interesting.
• A book based on a true story: The Monster of Florence by Douglas Preston & Mario Spezi - Picked this one up on audio from my local library. I found it a lot more intriguing and interesting than I anticipated.
• A book at the bottom of your to-read list: 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne - I read this as part of my through the alphabet quest even though I didn't really have any burning desire to read it. Now I kind of wish it had been in print so I could give the book away. Not a fan.
• A book your mom loves: Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman - After our book club read a Terry Pratchett book my mom has been picking up his books left and right. She recommended this as another book club read and I finally got to it. Hilarious.
• A book that scares you: The Key to Midnight by Dean Koontz - I don't really get scared by books often - the only one I can think of that really gave me the creepy, heart thumpy book scare was Koontz's What the Night Knows. I had this book waiting on my shelf so I read it and, though it wasn't a horror book it is all about brainwashing and identity and not knowing who you really are, all concepts that creep me out, so I kept it for this, even though it didn't really "scare" me.
• A book more than 100 years old: The Art of War by Sun Tzu - I'd read excerpts before and I'm glad I read the whole thing, but it was just kind of an, oh yeah I read that, type of book for me.
• A book based entirely on its cover: Labyrinth by Kate Mosse - I really liked the cover on this. The content of the cover didn't thrill me as much, though.
• A book you were supposed to read in school but didn’t: Hope Leslie by Catharine Maria Sedgwick - This was sitting on my Currently Reading shelf, so reading it completed this challenge and part of my personal challenge as well.
• A memoir: Bossypants by Tina Fey - This was highly entertaining.
• A book you can finish in a day: Anne & Henry by Dawn Ius - This popped up as one of the publisher's free reads on their website. It's a modern high school retelling of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn that I'd had on my TBR list. It was a Saturday and I had no plans, so I sat down and read the whole thing in a couple of hours. Entertaining.
• A book with antonyms in the title: Always Never Sometimes by Adi Alsaid - I actually picked up this ARC at BEA specifically because it had antonyms in the title. It was all right, but not a favorite.
• A book set somewhere you’ve always wanted to visit: Emily of New Moon by L.M. Montgomery - I reread this for the paper I'm working on that I will be presenting in PEI, so not only did I read it, but this year I finally get to visit this place!
• A book that came out the year you were born: The Ordinary Princess by M.M. Kaye - Not only did this come out the year I was born, but it's one of my favorite books of all time that I've really been wanting to reread. It's as wonderful as I remember it.
• A book with bad reviews: We Are Pirates by Daniel Handler - This one had the lowest star rating out of the 400 odd books in my TBR GoodReads list. It's ... odd. Very Handler. Very ... weird.
• A trilogy: The Arena Wars by Samantha Hoffman - I think I picked up the first book in this series as a free eBook and enjoyed it so much that I did what I rarely do and bought the second one. When I was looking at this list toward the end of the year I decided to buy the third book and finish off the trilogy.
• A book from your childhood: The Giver by Lois Lowry - It's so interesting revisiting books you haven't read in years and years. I still liked it, but not as much as I remember liking it when I was younger.
• A book with a love triangle: Famous in Love by Rebecca Serle - I really like these books, even if the love triangle drove me a little batty.
• A book set in the future: Armada by Ernest Cline - Love.
• A book set in high school: Also Known As by Robin Benway - This book was so cute. Very happy I read it in my alphabetical challenge.
• A book with a color in the title: The Blue Fairy Book edited by Andrew Lang - Collected fairy tales; what more could you want?
• A book that made you cry: Penderwicks in Spring by Jeanne Birdsall - Man, this book made me sob my eyeballs out. And laugh. And *sigh* these books are just perfection.
• A book with magic: Kill Me Softly by Sarah Cross - A really inventive fairy tale retelling. I'll be looking up the rest of the series.
• A graphic novel: The Sculptor by Scott McCloud - I found this interesting, though I wasn't as big a fan as I wanted to be.
• A book by an author you’ve never read before: Strawberry Acres by Grace S. Richmond - I had a collection of Richmond's books sitting on my eReader. They were sweet and light. A perfect old-fashioned delight.
• A book you own but have never read: The Girl in the Steel Corset by Kady Cross - This was another book good for both this list and my personal clearing out of my Currently Reading list
• A book that takes place in your hometown: Susquehanna by Harriet Segal - I had such a hard time with this one. I had 3 hometowns to choose from and finally ended up with the area where I currently live in order to find a book I could actually get ahold of. I wouldn't have sought this book out otherwise, but I did enjoy it.
• A book that was originally written in a different language: Poetics of Reverie by Gaston Bachelard - Oh Bachelard. I'm such a fan.
• A book set during Christmas: My True Love Gave to Me edited by Stephanie Perkins - Collection of lovely holiday stories.
• A book written by an author with your same initials: Space Cat by Ruthven Todd - Other than book set in my hometown, this was probably the category that caused me the most grief. In all of the books I own but haven't read (+2,000) and all the books on my GoodReads TBR list (+400) not a single one was written by someone with the initials RT. Not. A. Single. One. So I browsed the fiction and Juvenile section at the library where I work. Nada. YA section at the local library. 1 that really didn't look that interesting, though I kept it in mind in case I needed it. Finally found this one in the Young Readers section and I'm so glad I did because it's about a cat that goes to the moon and saves the astronaut. It was written before the moon missions and it's a really entertaining look at the speculation of what would be found on the moon as well as just an adorable story about a cat.
• A play: Taming of the Shrew by William Shakespeare - Hate this play with a burning passion.
• A banned book: The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian by Sherman Alexie - Hit this in my alphabetical challenge and really enjoyed it.
• A book based on or turned into a TV show: Naked Heat by Richard Castle - I've owned this for a while and just never got around to reading it. It's like reading a fanfic of the show, so it cracks me up.
• A book you started but never finished: The McCloud Home for Wayward Girls by Wendy Delsol - Another one on my GoodReads Currently Reading list that I cleared out. It was interesting, but not my cup of tea.

And that's the lot. I'm looking forward to diving into their 2016 challenge this year!

2016: A Review of a Year in Books

A few years ago, I came across a blog post where someone (I honestly have no idea who it was now, or I would link to it!) had kept track of what they read in Excel and used it to make little graphs to see stats on their reading for the year. I love that kind of stuff, so I bounced off their idea and created my own categories, just for my own curiosity.

I kept it up again this year, and decided to make my own graphs just to visually view the types of reading I had done over the course of 2015.

If you're curious, here they are!

Sort of an unspoken goal for me this year was to read more books by female authors than by male authors. This wasn't really a big goal, since I think a good story is a good story, no matter the gender of the author, but I was pleased to see I succeeded in my goal.
It's also interesting looking at the break down of the main character's gender. Some books (such as books of essays) don't have main characters, so those fall under the n/a and if a book has multiple viewpoints from both male and female perspectives I categorize them under "multiple" but overall it's a fairly balanced pie, with a definite leaning toward female main characters.

For this chart, standard means just the standard type of text format that most books are. Mostly I was curious about the other types of books I was reading.
And then of course, a look at the format in which I read them. I listen to audiobooks in my car, but didn't hit as many this year as I usually do. 13 of those were also from the Series of Unfortunate Events, so that accounts for most of the audiobooks I listened to this year.

 Although many books don't fit into hard and fast age ranges, they do tend to be marketed toward a particular age group. These are based on either where they tend to be sold in a bookstore, or my own perception (especially for the New Adult category).

This is the chart that intrigued me the most. I apologize for the fuzziness - I've tried a couple times, and can't seem to get it to render any more clearly. Anyway, I was shocked to see that I read more contemporary books than anything else this year, but looking back at the last couple of years I can see that, it's not that I read more contemporary (it's pretty equal with the last two years), but that I diversified in my other reading, spreading it out. These categories are also completely subjective to me, so a book I labeled as paranormal, someone else might have labeled fantasy. I just like creating fairly specific categories for myself. I also self-define some of them (such as magical realism, which I attached to books that had magical elements, but were set in a contemporary world).

Just out of curiosity, I like to see what different narrative styles I come across (a lot of non-fiction falls under the n/a category). The thing I found most intriguing this year, was how many books I read that had a mix of narrative styles, such as a book in both 1st and 3rd person.

 I still tend to rate books high, but I don't have a problem with that. I tend to round up (so if I give a book a 3.5, I'll make it a 4 star on GoodReads). But that also means that if I give a book 1 or 2 stars I really REALLY didn't like it.

 And finally, looking at page ranges. I read almost 52,000 words total (at least according to GoodReads and my own calculations), but this breaks it down for me a little more and I can see that I read quite a quantity of books with a fairly low page range. I don't think longer books are better, by any means, but I can see that a 50 page graphic novel will probably take less time to read than a 300 page novel. So it's just interesting to see it play out this way.

I can't say I'm planning on making any specific changes to my reading style based on these numbers, but I do find it really fascinating to look at my reading habits in a more graphic (pun intended) way :)

Bookish Resolutions: November Progress

AAAHHHHH!!! The year is almost over! How did it fly by so quickly?
I've already started thinking about what bookish resolutions I might want to make for next year. Keeping myself accountable here has really helped me to stay on track and I'm really pleased with the progress I've made.

November was a light reading month because I was doing NaNoWriMo (which I won handily this year. I'm still working on the rough draft and then I'll start the "real" rough draft of this story, but I'm really very super excited about how the character development and world building are coming together. But that's a blog post for another day).
So most of the time I might normally spend reading, I spent trying to get my word count in.

However, I think I still did pretty well.

1. Read 200 books in 2015:
I passed my goal! That's CRAZY PANTS. I'm at 205. And I still have a whole month left! I am, however, still about 5,000 pages lower than last year because of the picture books and young reader graphic novels. I'm not saying those books are somehow lesser, but it takes less time to read a 50 page young reader graphic novel than a 300 page adult novel. I've got several more books on deck for this month (and NaNo is over) so I should be able to make up a little of the page count.

2. Read 12 non-fiction books in 2015 (preferably 1 a month):
I did not read any non-fiction books this month (see NaNo madness), but I've done really well in this over the year, so I'm not even the slightest bit ashamed of this lack. I would like to hit one more in December, though, to end the year on an up note.

3. Clear out my Currently Reading GoodReads shelf:
DONE WON

4. Read at least 2 print books I already own each month (with an eye to weeding):
I read 3 this month, so pretty good. The Girl Who Could Not Dream by Sarah Beth Durst, which was beautiful and wonderful and definitely staying on my shelf. I also read Coraline by Neil Gaiman and Naked Heat by Richard Castle, both of which I've been meaning to eventually get around to and the PopSugar Reading Challenge pushed me to do so. Nothing weeded, but still a success.

5. Read at least 2 eBooks I own each month:
I got through 3 in this category as well. I finished The Red Fairy Book edited by Andrew Lang and Consumed by War by Samantha Hoffman, which not only took care of a Reading Challenge category, but also helped me finish off the trilogy while I still pretty much remembered the first two books. I also read The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte and discovered how very much I love Anne Bronte.

All in all a successful month. Here's to a strong December!

A Funny Thing Happened On the Way Through My Books

After moving to my new place and sifting through all my print books twice (once while packing them, once while unpacking them) and getting rid of probably 2-3 boxes of them and getting them all cataloged in LibraryThing (which is a magical site that allows me to stop buying duplicates of books ALL THE TIME) I decided that I really needed to catalog my eBooks too.

This took a long time and a lot of patience and several restarts as I changed the way I wanted to organize them.

Then I decided I really should mark every book that I haven't read.

All of these things combined to open my eyes to the plethora of books I own but haven't read, or am dying to reread, or will probably never read in a million years.

So a few more books went out the door. A handful of eBooks got deleted from my Nook account.

And I decided there had to be a better way of systematically reading all of those free eBooks and ARCs (Advanced Reader Copies or Galleys) that I had picked up over the years. So I did the logical thing and started with A. Well, actually I started with the books that have numbers for titles, because those get put before the As. And when I finish one I take of the "Unread" label and, if it's an eBook, I archive it so it doesn't show up on my Nook anymore, but I can download it again should I ever want to, or, if it's a print book, decide whether to put it back on the shelf or plop it in the to sell or donate box.

I started this toward the end of last year with my eBooks, and last month for print books. And so far I've read 30 eBooks and 4 print books I probably wouldn't have read (or wouldn't have read yet). Some of them I would have gotten to before others, since they were by favorite authors. But honestly, many of them would have probably languished on my Nook or bookshelf forever.

Some of them have been wonderful books. Some of them have been good. A couple have been awful. Many have been just okay. But they are all now read.

But I noticed something in the last week.

See, I get daily e-mails from three wonderful sites: BookBub, The Fussy Librarian, and Bookperk. You sign up for free, in some cases you select the genres, formats, content that you like and then they magically deliver a list of books that are cheap or free. Every. Day. It's magical. I've discovered sales on some of my favorite authors this way. I highly recommend them.

And it used to be that every day I would be downloading at least one free book. Every. Day.

That adds up to a lot of books. A lot of eBooks that were languishing on my Nook.

I noticed, now that I'm actively reading through many of these free books that I've downloaded in the past, I am much pickier about the ones I buy or download. Even if they're free. Because I have, according to my LibraryThing shelf, over 1,200 books I haven't read yet. TWELVE HUNDRED.

So instead of saying, like I used to, HEY IT'S FREE. DOWNLOAD ALL THE BOOKS, I say, Do I really want to add this to my list?

Sometimes the answer is YES.
Sometimes the answer is perhaps.
But more often now it's... probably not.

So by reading the books I already own I'm not only weeding out my personal collection, but I'm also keeping myself from adding to it!

A side benefit I never expected.

How are you at reading books you've already bought? Do you keep a tight rein on yourself or are you like me and own almost as many books you haven't read as those you have? Do you have a system that keeps you from buying or downloading more books than you could possibly read in one lifetime or did you give up on that long ago?

My Reading Year in Review

Yesterday I was reading Sarah Enni's review of her read books from 2013, and I thought that it would be interesting to do something like that for myself. I put together some different categories based on what I was personally interested in knowing about the books that I read, threw all the data into Excel and started playing with pie charts (so much fun)(yes I am a nerd).

And since I spent more time doing this than I would probably want to admit, I thought I would share my findings with all of you.

Before you look, I do want to make a couple of qualifiers:

1. This is very subjective. I assigned the genres, etc. as I saw that they fit, so a book I listed as a fantasy someone else might stick in another genre. And with many of the graphic novels I decided whether they were 1st or 3rd person based on my perception if it wasn't really obvious.
2. The "special format" chart is just based on my curiosity of some of the different formats. Graphic Novels are all different genres and geared toward different ages, so I was curious to see how many I read, but didn't want to take away from listing them as fantasy or contemporary or whatever.
3. For the Focus Age chart I broke it down into Kids (picture books or board books), MG (middle grade, chapter books, kind of 6ish-12ish years old), YA (teen), NA (New Adult (college or early 20s - the book either self-identified as such or that I perceived as belonging in this category), and Adult (anything else). Again this is based on my personal perspectives. I listed the Buffy graphic novels as Adult, though they could be considered either YA or NA, etc.
4. If there were multiple authors all of the same gender (such as CLAMP) I just listed them as that gender. Same with main characters. If there was more than one author of different genders I listed it as multiple (same with MCs) and with some of the graphic novels if there were multiple authors but it was clear that one was the major creator sometimes I just listed it under that one. Like I said in 1 - very subjective.

So this year I read 190 books, so there was a lot of data to compile. I've decided to keep a chart like this going over the next year so I can do this again without it taking as long.

If you're still curious after all this rigmarole here come the pie charts!

I did learn some interesting things about my reading and confirmed other things that I already knew. Like I read mostly fiction - I am now determining to try to read a little bit more non-fiction this year to broaden my tastes a bit. For genres Fantasy definitely took 1st place, which wasn't a surprise. But I read a lot more contemporary fiction than I thought and not as much historical fiction as I thought. I would like to balance these out just a bit, but I love me some fantasy and dystopian so this probably won't change a whole lot this year, and I'm perfectly fine with that. The genders of authors and main characters was about what I expected. I thought I had a bit of a nice balance in both, though I think I'd like to read more books from male perspectives since I always struggle writing the male voice and another goal I have is to work on revising my WIP, which alternates between a male and a female.

Overall I found this an interesting exercise just to see what my reading habits are. I keep track of books on GoodReads (which is amazing and you should totally be on it if you aren't), but to see them broken down this way is quite intriguing.

Two for Tuesday: Books you HAVE to go read. Now.

I have been doing SO much fun reading since I got out of school. It's like I'm trying to suck up as much "fun" stuff before I get bogged down in theory and having to analyze everything again.

see more Lolcats and funny pictures, and check out our Socially Awkward Penguin lolz!

Sorry, I just can't seem to resist these adorable LOLCats!

And I recently read two amazing books that I wanted to plug a little bit because I loved them so much.

The first is Divergent by Veronica Roth.

Seriously. Read this book. Oh my goodness it's like amazing. See I even went all italicky on you to show you how serious I am. I found the beginning a little bit slow, but then I was all ZOMW I CAN'T BELIEVE I'M ALMOST DONE NO I DON'T WANT IT TO END WAIT WHAT THE HAY BALE OH MY WERD FREAK OUT AND WHOA.

So read it.

Here's my Goodreads review (because I'm lame lazy and don't want to rewrite the thing.)

Honestly, at very first I was interested, but not totally sucked in. Yeah, that didn't last long. Oh my goodness I love this book. I love Tris and Tobias and Caleb and Christina and Will. These characters are so vivid, so vibrant, so astoundingly real that you just can't help but hold your breath for them.

Beatrice has known for a long time that she's just not selfless enough to spend her life in Abnegation. But that means she has to choose a different faction and turn her back on her family. Easier said than done. And now that she's in the middle of Dauntless initiation she's even more confused as to where she belongs. She's taken a new name, making new friends, and even getting a tattoo (or two), but does all of that really change who she is or who she wants to be? And what will she do when everything she's worked for starts crashing down around her?

Go. Read. Love :)


And the second book is Myra McEntire's Hourglass.

I just finished this on Saturday and I didn't want to put it down. From the very beginning I was hooked on Emerson's voice. I hit this one line, which I can't remember exactly, but it was about a guy screaming like a lady who's forgotten to take her panties off the line when the preacher comes to call. I mean, who comes up with a word picture like that! I loved it. Definite laugh out loud moments, but a lot of intensity too. Time travel, hot guys (yes plural), mysterious men, loving family, and did I mention TIME TRAVEL?! So fantastic. You totally should go read it. Like right now.

Emerson just wants to be normal. Which is really not easy when you have to walk through southern belles just to get into your house. But she really doesn't want to see this new "consultant" her brother hired. She knows he's just trying to help, but she's had enough of hokum and hospitals. Then she meets Michael and he sees the things she sees. And he tells her she's not seeing ghosts, she's seeing time ripples. And she just might have more power than she could ever have realized. But what is she going to do about it? And what is Michael hiding? They have the opportunity to change everything, but can they trust each other enough?

Both lovely ladies have blogs and stuff (you can get to them by clicking on their names) and, if you haven't bought either of the books, they're both ON SALE and you can get to that by clicking on the titles.

So those are my two for Tuesday... have you read anything you loved lately? DO TELL! I'm always looking for my next fab read :D

The System

So I was over at Hannah's mah-velous blog and she asked the question: How do you decide what to read next? Do you have a system? Do you just go down your list?

So I was about to leave a small book as a comment and then decided it would be ever so much more fun to write a post about it.

And since it's Monday and I'm supposed to do literarily related stuff on Monday and I've been horrible about keeping any kind of consistency, I thought it would be good to go ahead and do it.

Besides, this allows me to procrastinate from finishing my syllabus like I'm supposed to be doing. haha!

So here is my approximate system for deciding what to read next:

1. Oh Look! I just finished this book. Wow! It was great! (or hm. It could have been better. [or snort. why did I just waste my life reading that?]) I will write it down in my notebook and find a picture to add it to my slideshow on my blog!
2. Ooh Look! A pretty cover! I TOTES wants to read Book A!
3. Oh yeah. I've got four other books that I've started and still haven't finished. Maybe I should read one of those.
4. But THIS cover is AH-mazing! And So-and-So said it was really good! I should read Book B!
5. Oooohhhh! The new book in X series came out! I've been reading the series, so I should do that one next.
6. But I did promise Hannah and everyone that I would read The Stand and I've only read like 5 chapters. I should pick that one up again.
7. But I'm going on vacation soon. I can read it then. It's just SO THICK!
8. Hey, what did I step on? Oh! I forgot I picked up this ARC at work! Hm. Maybe I should read that one.
9. But I really need to finish Mountains Beyond Mountains before school starts.
10. Speaking of school. I have to read Pride and Prejudice for class, so I should probably do that one.
11. But that is RESPONSIBLE and it is SUMMER! I REJECT the responsible!
12. Let me go on the blogs and see if there's anything interesting.
13. I now have 4,267 more books that I want to read! Why does everyone have to talk about these fantastic books? *pouts*
14. Oh forget it. I'll just go watch a movie.
15. Hey! I didn't know this movie was based on a book! I want to read it now!
16. Oh fine, I'll just read *closes eyes, spins in circles and chooses a book at random* THIS ONE!

Unfortunately this IS quite possibly VERY close to how I actually do end up choosing what book to read next.

So I will pass the question on to you: How do YOU decide what to read next? Is there anyone that keeps a list of TBR? Are you spastic and just grab whatever tickles your fancy?

What I Read This Year - Post 4

Wow. This is my final post. I think I'll do this monthly or quarterly instead of yearly, because this was kind of ridiculous, but I had so much fun with it. Alrighty here we go.....

71. Finding Lost: Season 1 and 2 by Nikki Stafford (A fantastic, can't live without it guide to Lost. I read this along with our rewatch over the hiatus and it was amazing and informative and hilarious. Love it.)

72. The Van Alen Legacy by Melissa De La Cruz (The fourth book in this series. Pretty good. It had been too long since I had read the first ones and it took me a bit to figure out what was going on, but I enjoyed it.)

73. In a Perfect World by Laura Kasischke (It seems like this book should be depressing when you read the premise, but it totally wasn't. A very sweet story. I really enjoyed it.)

74. Return to the Hundred Acre Wood by David Benedictus (I am a HUGE Winnie-the-Pooh fan - the original stories with the Shepard illustrations. I thought this looked fun. I was very disappointed with it. I felt that it lacked the charm and the accessibility of the originals. It seemed like the author was just trying too hard and it came off awkward to me.)

75. Heat Wave by Richard Castle (Castle is one of my all time favorite shows airing and this was like reading an episode of the show - but one written by Castle. Absolutely hysterical. I about died laughing when I saw that the "Castle" character in the book was named "Rook". If you don't get it look at the two quoted words and think geek. Yeah, I am one.)

76. Perfect Mistake by Kate Brian (Another novel in the Privileged series. Absolutely love her characterizations. I am dying for the next book in this series.)

77. Vampire Diaries: The Awakening and The Struggle by L.J. Smith (I admit I read these because of the tv show. I enjoyed them. Very different than the show, but good.)

78. Finding Lost: Season 3 by Nikki Stafford (Have I mentioned that these are the best guides you could ever hope to have when watching Lost? No? Well, these are the best guides you could ever hope to have when watching Lost! Go buy them!)

79. Tempted by P.C. and Kristin Cast (The most recent book in their House of Night series. Very interesting.)

80. Evernight by Claudia Gray (Totally not what I expected in a good way. I keep forgetting to pick up the sequel, but I am dying to know what happens next!)

81. Vampire Diaries: The Fury and Dark Awakening by L.J. Smith (Enjoyed this continuation of the series, but I'm really wondering how close to the book plot the tv show is going to be, because it's totally not at all like this right now.)

82. Finding Lost: Season 4 by Nikki Stafford (If you own season 4 of Lost, then you need to own this book too. So great! and no, Nikki pays me nothing to say any of this, but you should totally check out her blog! We have WAY too much fun over there!)

83. Lord of the Flies by William Golding (I had never read this before. I didn't have what you might call a "normal" high school experience. So now I'm going back and reading a lot of the stuff people usually read in high school. Besides, this was referenced on Lost and has like a million parallels! It was so much fun to look at that. Crazy, crazy book though. And sad.)

84. Ophelia Joined the Group Maidens That Don't Float: Classic Lit Signs on to Facebook by Sarah Schmelling (I knew she had to be an English major, because only one of us would come up with such a hysterically crazy idea as this. She took plots and characters and created Facebook feeds. So Funny. LOL moments like - Jane Eyre joined the group "governesses that love their masters" - Maria VonTrapp likes this - not word for word, but you get the idea. Great fun.)

85. Bone by Jeff Smith (This was the one volume compilation of the ten Bone books. I absolutely adored this book. It was so fantastic! I'm just starting to get into graphic novels and this one was a winner for me.)


So that does it. Wow! 85 books! I can hardly believe it. A lot of good authors and stories, a few duds, but a pretty good average. Thanks for putting up with my extreme English major geekiness and maybe you walked away with a few book ideas. Leave me any of your recommendations. I'm always looking for something good to read! :)

What I Read This Year - Post 3

Whew... This is taking more posts than I anticipated, but I love books, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised.


51. Elyon by Ted Dekker (Another title in his YA series. Pretty good)

52. Raven Rise by D.J. MacHale

53. Soldiers of Halla by D.J. MacHale (The final book in the series. It was satisfying. There was a whole lot of exposition, but there really wasn't any other way to explain all the mythology so that the ending worked. All in all a nice end to a series I thoroughly enjoyed.)

54. Thirteenth Child by Particia Wrede (Loved it. Historical fantasy? How do you make THAT work? She does. I want to read the next one.)

55. Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafon (Another book our store focused on. Very dense prose. I really liked it, but it took me a while to get through it.)

56. Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher (Absolutely heartbreaking and beautifully written. This is one of those books that will stay with you.)

57. The Weight of Silence by Heather Gudenkauf (Fascinating book with a great twist.)

58. Wild At Heart by John Eldredge (The counterpart to Captivating, this book explores God's design for and of men. Very enlightening.)

59. Sold by Patricia McCormick (A heartrending fictional account of a real atrocity - the sale of young girls and women into prostitution.)

60. The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman (A very good book. I read this one on the recommendation of Blam and thoroughly enjoyed it. If you like Harry Potter or Percy Jackson you should enjoy this one, too.)

61. The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster (I had never read this before and now I want to know why! It was amazing and I loved all the play on words. Fun, fun, fun.)

62. Evil at Heart by Chelsea Cain (I picked up an ARC of her second book, Sweetheart, quickly saw it was a sequel, so I read her first one, Heartsick first. Not my usual fare at all, but it totally sucked me in. Liked the first one a lot. Second one was okay. Third one was necessary to wrap things up, but started to feel like a repeat of the first two. I hope she moves to new characters for her next book.)

63. Prophecy of the Sisters by Michelle Zink (Not only is this book fantastic, but Michelle is one of the nicest authors you will ever meet. I am lucky enough that she is a local author and came to do a signing at our store. She is a fantastic lady and her book is wonderful. I am dying for the sequel to come out.)

64. The End by Lemony Snicket (Listened to this on audio. I've read the entire Series of Unfortunate Events multiple times. I love it so much.)

65. The Miserable Mill by Lemony Snicket (Another audio.)

66. A Summer to Remember by Mary Balogh (I really like the way Mary draws her characters. They are great.)

67. The Guinea Pig Diaries by A.J. Jacobs (A friend of mine recommended The Know-It-All to me a few years ago and I've been following Jacobs' books ever since. This one was fun, but I preferred his first two books over it.)

68. The Earl Claims His Wife by Cathy Maxwell (I feel really bad because I can't remember anything about this book or why I picked it up.)

69. Sweet Revenge by Diane Mott Davidson (I got this book on audio and fell in love with the author. I like a good mystery and she delivers with character, plot, humor and heart.)

70. Suspicion by Kate Brian (Another book in the Private series. I'm pretty sure Kate is a Lost fan after reading this book. Deserted islands, a character named Sawyer that always has his nose in a book... I recognize the signs :)

Well, one more post ought to finish this up. Maybe I'll get to that tomorrow.

What I Read This Year - Post 2

Now that I've actually gotten a comment by one of the authors of one of the books I mentioned/read/reviewed I'm a little scared. But I'm not gonna lie about the ones I didn't like and I want to rave about the ones I did, so if you liked a book I didn't, that's fine - after all, that's why there are so many books out there for all of us different people :)

Onward and Upward...

21. Godmother: The Secret Cinderella Story by Carolyn Turgeon (I did not like this book. I felt like the end was a major copout. The premise sounded interesting, but I was deeply dissatisfied when I finished it.)

22. Pendragon Before the War: Book One of the Travelers by D.J. MacHale & Carolyn Jablonski (I love the Pendragon series, but it had been a while since I had read the series. These prequels were interesting, but sometimes it felt like there were continuity errors from the regular stories. Maybe it was my faulty memory or maybe it was the fact that they were written by other people. I enjoyed them, but they aren't necessary at all for enjoying the series.)
23. Malice by Lisa Jackson (This came in as an ARC [Advanced Reader's Copy] and looked interesting. I really liked it. I would definitely read more by this author, I just haven't yet.)

24. Pendragon Before the War: Book Two of the Travelers by D.J. MacHale and Walter Sorrells (See 22)

25. City of Thieves by David Benioff (Our store chose various books throughout the year to focus on. This was one of them. I discovered a lot of great books and authors through that program. I liked this book overall. It was funny and heart-breaking and somehow not depressing, though the subject matter should have made it so. Too crass for my personal taste and I struggled with finishing it because of that.)

26. Pendragon Before the War: Book Three of the Travelers by D.J. MacHale and Walter Sorrells (see 22)

27. Princess of the Midnight Ball by Jessica Day George (This was a retelling of The Twelve Dancing Princesses. I absolutely adored it. Such a fantastic retelling. I would definitely recommend it.)

28. Y: The Last Man by Brian K. Vaughn (I picked this series of graphic novels up because of Lost and because one of the regular posters over at Nikki Stafford's site recommends them regularly. I enjoyed the plot line and the characters. Intriguing premise and man did I cry at the end. However, I am fairly conservative and there were too many "adult" scenes and too much profanity. It made me personally uncomfortable. Brilliant author, fantastic premise, but I wouldn't recommend it to anyone I know because of some of the other stuff.)

29. Fables Volumes 1-11 by Bill Willingham (When a friend of mine saw me reading Y, she told me I should try reading these. They were fun.)

30. Bone Man's Daughters by Ted Dekker (He has become

one of my favorite authors and this book was well done. Not one of my favorites of his, but a great thriller and I have recommended it to a number of people.)

31. Fragile Eternity by Melissa Marr (Oh Melissa. I had a chance to meet her at BEA and she was so nice. She's an amazing author, too. If you haven't read any of her books go pick up Wicked Lovely right now. I recommend them to people all the time.)

32. The Merchant of Death by D.J. MacHale (The last book in the series was about to come out, so I decided to reread the entire series. I'm glad I did, because I had forgotten a lot of the details and I enjoyed the last book even more. Great series, a fun premise. Overall a very enjoyable read.)

33. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer (This book was probably my all time favorite one for the year. If you have not read it yet, drop everything and read it right now. It is such a shame that the author passed away in February, because that means she won't be writing any more books. This was another book my store focused on and I loved it so much. It has everything. You will laugh, you will cry and your life will be richer because you read it.)

34. The Lost City of Faar by D.J. MacHale (probably my favorite book in the Pendragon series.)

35. The Reluctant Heiress by Eva Ibbotson (I read A Countess Below Stairs and loved it. This one was good, but not as good as that one, in my opinion. But I love her books and plan on reading more.)

36. The Last Olympian by Rick Riordan (Loved it. A great end to a fantastic series. Can't wait for his next series to start coming out.)

37. Captivating by John and Stasi Eldredge (I did this as a girl's Bible study at my church. It's an amazing book and you will not look at men and women the same after reading this. [in a good way] I highly recommend it. I found it has helped me to better understand people around me, both girls and guys.)

38. The Never War by D.J. MacHale

39. The Reality Bug by D.J. MacHale (Scary, because I could totally see our society heading toward this if we had the technology.)

40. Black Water by D.J. MacHale

41. Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins (Usually when there is a trilogy, the second book is a bit of a let down. It usually feels like you're treading water, just waiting for the third and end to come. Not so with this one. I was expecting to be let down, but it was just as good, if not better than The Hunger Games. Absolutely brilliant. Please, do yourself a favor and read these books. The third one is due out later this year and I CANNOT wait for it.)

42. The Rivers of Zadaa by D.J. MacHale

43. Beautiful Disaster by Kate Brian (This is part of the Privilege series that was a spin off of the Private series. In my opinion they are ten time better. The main character and her nemesis are tautly written sociopaths and are just as good as any characterization in a regular mystery/thriller.)

44. First Comes Marriage by Mary Balogh (I never used to read anything that could be considered a romance novel. But the characters in this series intrigued me. I just skip over the, what seems to be mandatory two page bedroom scene, and thoroughly enjoy the writing and characterization. I fell in love with this family. If you should happen to see this, Mary, please, please, please, please, please write a book about their cousin! I can't stand not knowing what made him the way he is and I want to see him have a happy ever after, too.)

45. Then Comes Seduction by Mary Balogh

46. Lunatic by Ted Dekker (This is part of his YA series, which is a spin off of his Circle trilogy and Paradise novels. I enjoy them, but they definitely aren't his best.)

47. At Last Comes Love by Mary Balogh

48. The Quillan Games by D.J. MacHale

49. The Pilgrims of Rayne by D.J. MacHale (Major plot twist in this one makes it one of my favorites in the Pendragon series.)

50. Seducing an Angel by Mary Balogh

What I Read This Year - Post 1

Last year a friend of mine from another blogosphere posted her list of books she had read over the past year. I loved the idea of actually keeping track, so I started. It was the beginning of February before I began, so I'm sure I missed a few from January or listed some that I actually read in December, but other then that I was actually very faithful at writing down each book as I read it.

The list looks really long, but I realized when looking over it that a LOT of it was what my boss calls "Brain Candy". It has no real substance, but it's still enjoyable to read. I was kind of disappointed with myself, but then I realized that I will be going to grad school and have no time for "Brain Candy" books, so this was like my year off.Since the list is so long I'm going to break it up into a couple of posts so people don't get bored and I don't get bored. So here goes....

1. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins (One of the best books I have read in a long time. Her characters are so vivid. It's written in first person, so you become emotional attached very quickly. The premise is interesting and it is the first book that I can ever remember wanting to read again the moment I finished it. Excellent, excellent book. I cannot recommend it strongly enough. Every person who has read it, that I've talked to, has loved it.)

2. Paradise Lost by Kate Brian (One of my coworkers hooked me on this series. Not at all my usual book fare, but once you read the first one, each book ends with a cliffhanger and you feel oddly compelled to keep reading, even when you are getting annoyed with the ridiculousness of the main character.)

3. Tru Confessions by Janet Tashjian (I read this because I loved the movie that was made by Disney. One of the few cases where I actually liked the movie better. The book was all right, but the movie is amazing. If you can get your hands on the movie please watch it. It's about a girl struggling with the impact of having a twin that is developmentally disabled. Shia Labeouf plays her twin brother and is absolutely brilliant. Some of his best acting ever.)

4. Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Titan's Curse by Rick Riordan (My sister hooked me on these books and they are amazing and fun and you need to go read them all now. The movie is coming out based on the first one. I want to see it, but do yourself a favor and read it first. Riordan has already said they've made some significant changes so I'm a bit worried, but the books are just great.)

5. Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The battle of the Labyrinth by Rick Riordan (ditto)

6. Diary of a Wimpy Kid by Jeff Kinney (We could not keep these in stock, so I decided to read it for "research" to answer parent's questions about them. Pretty funny, but I don't know if I'd let my eight year old read it. The main character's not exactly a role model.)

7. Cinderella (As if You Don't Already Know the Story) by Barbara Ensor (I was really disappointed with this book. I love retellings of fairy tales and the back was pretty funny, but the story was drab and didn't vary much at all from the standard Cinderella story.)

8. The Little Prince by Antoine de saint Exupery (I read this because Lost 5.04 was titled "The Little Prince" and we had a copy in the house. It blew my mind with Lost parallels and started me on a little bit of a personal project to uncover and read books that are referenced by the show. Besides, it was a really fun book.)

9. Running From the Law by Lisa Scottoline (Listened to this one on CD during my commute. Back before my car got robbed and I actually had a CD player :( Ah well. A good mystery. Enjoyed it.)

10. Yes Man by Danny Wallace (I picked up this because the Jim Carrey movie looked funny with an interesting premise. The introduction was hysterical, but it went down hill fast. I wouldn't recommend it. I found it boring and really wish I had not forced my way through the end of it. The book could have been 1/3 as long and made the same point.)

11. Blue Bloods by Melissa De La Cruz (With the Twilight craze, lots of people are looking for books to turn to once they've finished the Saga. I started reading through some of the various vampire series because I liked Twilight and I wanted to be able to give people knowledgeable recommendations. All my coworkers know I am the one to come to for recommendations for anyone from 8-18. This series was one of the better vampire ones. I found the first book a little hard to get into, but once she really started revealing the mythology I was fascinated. She ties in biblical, historical and mythical references to create something completely different than any other vampire story I've read.)

12. Masquerade by Melissa De La Cruz

13. Revelation by Melissa De La Cruz

14. Hood by Stephen Lawhead (I had been eyeing this book for a long time and finally picked it up. It wasn't at all what I was expecting, but I've never read the original Robin Hood stories, so maybe it's closer to that than to the Disney version [haha]. It was weightier than I was expecting, but enjoyable. I've been wanting to read the second one, Scarlet, but haven't had a chance yet.

15. Happy Hour at Casa Dracula by Marta Acosta (Picked this out of the bargain bin. Fun vampire romp. More adult than the YA books, but without getting into "adult" heavy scenes. I liked it and was excited to see there are a couple sequels. Got my hands on the third, but don't want to read it until I find the second.)

16. Hunted by P.C. and Kristin Cast (Another YA vampire series. It's pretty good, but a few things about it bother me. One is the godde

ss worship that is a major part of the mythos and the other was the "adult" content [though that was mainly in the first book, if I remember correctly]. I've kept up with it because I'm interested to see how the authors play everything out, but if I had to do it over I probably wouldn't read them.)

17. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak (So many people were coming in for this book, from teenagers to book clubbers, that I decided to read it. Fascinating, gripping, wonderfully painful book. If you like WWII books or historical fiction you should read it. It's from the common people's perspective on the other side. Not Jewish, as has been done so many times, but the German people as they struggled to survive the war just like everyone else. The narrator is "death" literally, which is fascinating and bizarre. Good book. I cried a lot.)

18. Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Demigod Files by Rick Riordan (

Tie in stories that go along with the Percy Jackson series. A lot of fun.)

19. Carrie by Stephen King (Another book I read because of Lost. My first ever

Stephen King. I didn't find it scary, but extremely sad.)

20. Finding Lost: Season 3 by Nikki Stafford (It seems fitting to end this first post of books I've read with one of Nikki's. She is the reason I started blogging in the first place. I picked up this book at work since I was beginning to really get into the show. It had her blog address on the back and the rest, as they say, is history. If you like Lost you HAVE to read her books. They are insightful and witty and amazingly perceptive. I cannot recommend them, or her, highly enough. She's literally changed my life over the past year in a lot of crazy, but good ways.)

There. Now you see why I'm breaking this into multiple entries. I haven't even hit the half way mark yet. Wasn't planning on writing mini reviews for each one, but there you go. More to come hopefully in the next couple of days.

Have you read any good books this past year? I'd love to hear some of your favorites!