Reading ... and life in general

If you read my blog at all, you'll notice that the previous update took place at 7am on 13 October, just as Dewey's 24-hour read-a-thon was beginning. Needless to say, I didn't follow through with the read-a-thon at all. Unlike in previous years when I had been able to set aside the entire day and have nothing else scheduled, this Saturday was full of plans and commitments. I drove to my son's house to pick up his 2 year old daughter, we drove to my produce co-op to pick up the week's allotment, the two of us went to my other son's house to stay with his 2 year old son, and by supper time, all the reading I had accomplished was listening to a couple of disks in the car. By the time I got back home around 8pm, I was thoroughly disgruntled that I hadn't been able to participate at all in any of the Dewey activities. I did run around to a number of blogs to cheer on other participants, but I just abandoned my participation entirely—which is why there's only the one post here in my blog. (That's not to say that I didn't read, I just didn't track it as closely and I went to bed at a normal time instead of staying up all night long.)

This morning is the first day of a read-a-thon we're calling “Reading Through the End of the World and Beyond”. It's being held over at BookObsessed and there's still time to join us if you're interested.

Today, I read the last page of the 148th book of 2012. At the beginning of the year, I set the goal of reading 150 books, and I think I'm going to get there and maybe a book or two beyond. All the books have been recorded in this blog at The Books of 2012. Books read in previous years are documented in the respective pages which are linked from the sidebar.

So, although months and months have gone by since I updated this blog, I have been reading. In fact, since the previous post, I have read 28 books. Maybe more impressive is that those books contained a total of 9035 pages. That's an average of 1000 pages per week.

So, I'm off to do some Christmas shopping—listening to an audio book as I drive—and then I'll settle down to some old-fashioned reading of text later today. I hope your day will be as pleasant.

Dewey's Read-a-Thon: the beginning

When I went to Dewey's home page, I was blown away by this new logo! Cheers to the artist who created it. It perfectly embodies the concept—reading around the clock, night and day. And so it begins again this year. Since I'm in Texas, I'll be reading from 7am on Saturday until 7am on Sunday. Most of the day, I'll be away from the computer, so I won't be posting frequent updates as I have in the past. But I'll be reading during all my free time.

There will be less free time today as in prior Read-a-thons. I've gladly embraced the opportunity to care for my two grandkids on Saturdays. I start in the morning at Victoria's house and then the two of us pack up and head over to Aiden's house for the afternoon. When their daddies get home in the evening, I head back home. Reading-wise, I do get to spend at least 2 hours listening to an audio book. But there will be much of the daytime when I will not be reading. I hope to manage to stay awake all night—in contrast to previous events when I fell asleep in the wee hours—and therefore make significant progress through my TBR stack.

I'm starting with these books: in paperback, White Witch, Black Curse by Kim Harrison; on my Kindle: Fire Burn and Cauldron Bubble by H P Mallory; audio CD: The Expected One by Kathleen McGowan

Introductory Questionnaire

1) What fine part of the world are you reading from today?

I'm at my home location in North Texas.

2) Which book in your stack are you most looking forward to?

I really would like to finish White Witch, Black Curse by Kim Harrison. I'm planning on sending it to a fellow reader along with other books, and this is the last one I need to finish before I can pack them up and hand them to the mailman.

3) Which snack are you most looking forward to?

Today is distribution day for Bountiful Baskets Food Co-op, so I'm looking forward to some yummy fresh fruit to snack on.

4) Tell us a little something about yourself!

I have two grandchildren who are both 2 years old, and their parents work on Saturdays, so I get to spend the whole day with the grandkids. It's such a blessing. Of course, that cuts into Dewey reading time, but I'll still have the overnight hours to dedicate to reading.

5) If you participated in the last read-a-thon, what’s one thing you’ll do different today? If this is your first read-a-thon, what are you most looking forward to?

This is my 7th time to participate in the Read-a-Thon. I look forward to it and try to clear my calendar so there are few distractions. Of course, caring for the grandkids restricts my reading time during the hours that they are awake.

Read-a-thon updates

   

I think it's time for another update on read-a-thon progress. Today is the next-to-last day of FrightFall and the second day of FraterFest. I took Friday off work and spent several dedicated hours reading. As a result, I read a total of 197 pages on Friday compared to an average of 75 on each on the days that I was at work. Although today is Saturday, I have family activities planned that will cut into the free time available for reading. The good news is that I'm currently at page 357 of 529 in Academ's Fury. I don't know if I will finish it today—but definitely by tomorrow.

Current reads are Academ's Fury by Jim Butcher and Fire Burn and Cauldron Bubble by H P Mallory. The latter might fulfill the requirement of FraterFest to read a “bump in the night book (vampire, zombie, shapeshifter, ghost etc).” It's not very scary, but the main characters are a witch and a wizard.

Thursday, October 4

Number of books I've read today: 1
Number of pages I've read today: 60
Number of books completed today: 0

Friday, October 5

Number of books I've read today: 2
Number of pages I've read today: 197
Number of books completed today: 0

FraterFest Read-a-Thon - starting position

Today is the first day of FraterFest, and intense four-day read-a-thon. The sponsor, Kimba, has asked the participants to include one book by Rhiannon Frater or a bump in the night book (vampire, zombie, shapeshifter, ghost etc).

Now, I hated to admit it, but I had not heard of Rhiannon Frater prior to signing up for the read-a-thon. I immediately checked out her bibliography and found out that The First Days—her first book in the As The World Dies series—is set in the Texas Hill Country just a couple hours south of my home. That certainly adds to its appeal. I'm going to try to track down a copy of that book today. The book and series have mixed reviews, so I won't spring for an eBook or a new paperback, but a used book would be good to find.

So, starting position. I am in the middle of a great fantasy novel, Academ's Fury by Jim Butcher. Academ's Fury is the second book in Butcher's Codex Alera series, set in a world where the forces of nature take on personalities. These “furies” bond with talented individuals who direct their capabilities to protect the land from their enemies. By the way, Butcher is the author/creator of The Dresden Files starring wizard Harry Dresden, a private detective who takes on paranormal investigations.

I suppose I should also include a couple of goals. I intend to read 400 pages during the read-a-thon. And, if I can find a copy, one of the books I read will be by Rhiannon Frater. If not, I will read a frightful book from my stash—either The Demon You Know by Christine Warren or White Witch, Black Curse by Kim Harrison.

Now, less blogging and more reading!

FrightFall Read-a-Thon: the half-way mark

It's Thursday and that means FrightFall is half-way done. So far, I've read 343 pages in three different books. On Tuesday morning, I finished reading The Outlaw Demon Wails by Kim Harrison. (I was on page 337 when the read-a-thon began.) I immediately picked up Academ's Fury by Jim Butcher. As of this post, I'm on page 168 and making pretty good progress considering that this is a normal work week and I don't get to read until work is over. Also on Tuesday, I listened to one chapter of The Expected One by Kathleen McGowan.

Monday, October 1

Number of books I've read today: 1
Number of pages I've read today: 90
Number of books completed today: 0

Tuesday, October 2

Number of books I've read today: 3
Number of pages I've read today: 95
Number of books completed today: 1

Wednesday, October 3

Number of books I've read today: 1
Number of pages I've read today: 43
Number of books completed today: 0

FrightFall Read-a-thon Begins

It begins. Sponsor Michelle emphasizes that FrightFall is to be “a week of relaxed reading during which we can personally challenge ourselves and whittle away those ever looming TBR piles/shelves/libraries.” Today, the mission is to place a stake in the ground to mark our beginning positions and list goals in the form of reading lists. Since FrightFall officially began at midnight, and I was still awake and reading, I marked my current location and that's where I'm starting.

My current book is The Outlaw Demon Wails by Kim Harrison. It's got witches, demons, vampires, weres, pixies, and elves—not to mention a kitten, a Siamese fighting fish, and a tankful of sea monkeys. I think that's probably scary enough to meet the requirement for the read-a-thon. Oh? Did I mention that the story also takes place the week of Halloween? Now, this novel is book #6 in Harrison's Hollows series set in Cincinnati and starring witch Rachel Morgan. There are 10 books currently available and #11 is due out in January.

Now, when we talk about TBR stacks, there are several of them at my house. There are the BookCrossing books which I have committed to mail to book swappers at the BookObsessed forums and the books that I'm simply eager to read—most of which are in series which I have been enjoying. Since I have a couple of looming due dates, I'm going to focus on the first set, the owed TBRs, during this read-a-thon. That means you are likely to see me starting Academ's Fury by Jim Butcher, Dream Called Time by S L Viehl, Blood Bound by Patricia Briggs, or The Demon You Know by Christine Warren. All from the fantasy, science fiction, and paranormal genre, and the paranormals should meet all criteria for “scary” stories.

BTT: Carry-ons

It's Thursday and Deb has posted another Booking Through Thursday prompt. This week, bloggers are asked:

Do you bring the book(s) you’re reading with you when you go out? How? Physically, or in an e-reader of some kind? Have your habits in this regard changed?

What? Of course I do. I find it hard to believe that there are readers who don't take a book when them wherever they go. I've come to accept that there are some people who just aren't readers, and I wouldn't expect that they'd take a book when they go out.

Now the remainder of the question is interesting. “How?” Any form available. Each time I leave the house I take a conventional books or my Kindle—sometimes both. It depends on which book I'm actively reading at the time. I also have one book loaded onto my cell phone so that I simply cannot be caught without something to read. When I'm the driver, I have an audiobook on CD in the car stereo. When hubby is driving, I've likely got my nose into a paperback or my Kindle. (There are currently 1685 books loaded onto my Kindle.)

One special case of “when you go out” is the road trip. We typically take at least 3 road trips a year and I prepare a small box of books which I place into the car. As we travel, I can choose my next read from the box or from my Kindle. This photo is of the book box from our most recent road trip in August as we drove from Anaheim to home in Texas. Most of the time when the car was in motion, I was reading. Since my vacation took placed during the Summer Wrap-up Read-a-Thon and Bout of Books 5.0, I completed seven books from the box along with three books from my Kindle.

Read-a-Thon time again

The 2012 Autumnal Equinox occurred today at 9:49 a.m. CDT (14:49 Universal Time). Although today is the official beginning of Autumn, it will be at least another month before the temperature is noticeably cooler. BUT, even though it doesn't feel like Autumn yet, the Fall Read-a-Thons are coming up soon.

   

After the frenzy of four back-to-back read-a-thons in July and August, I decided to take a short break. The next one I'm going to participate in is the “Summer is Over” Read-a-Thon which starts on Friday, 28 September over at BookObsessed. It's just a week-end event, running Friday through Monday, 1 October. Starting on the 1st is the FrightFall Read-a-Thon, one of four seasonal week-long read-a-thons sponsored by Michelle who blogs at The True Book Addict. Overlapping that one is another week-end event: the Fraterfest Read-a-Thon which is scheduled for 5-8 October.

Whew! After 11 straight days of frantic reading and blogging and tweeting, I'll appreciate a short break before the dedicated focus that is the Dewey's 24-Hour Read-a-Thon. It's held 2 times a year (in April and October) and this time it's happening on Saturday, 13 October.

Dewey's 24-Hour Read-a-Thon begins at midnight UCT on the 13th of October—that's 7 am here in Texas—and it runs as the name says for 24-hours. Readers all around the world read and blog about reading and participate in challenges. The last couple of times, I've found it hard to stay awake after 2am. I don't stress about it, though I would love to be able to brag about concentrating on reading for a full 24 hours.

Book Blogger Hop: 31 August - 6 September 2012

With a busy weekend, I didn't get around to the Book Blogger Hop until today. This week's question is:

What is the one book or series you are dying to see turned into a movie or tv series?

Like many of the fans of Anne McCaffrey's Dragonriders of Pern, I'd love to see it made into a TV series or a series of movies. Unfortunately, the movie rights have been held by Canadian production house named Copperheart Entertainment since 2006. In April 2012, the science fiction community was all a-twitter at the announcement that David Hayter had been hired to write the script for Dragonflight and that production was to start in early 2012. Although IMDb lists the movie as "in production", apparently there's no director and no cast. In other words, it's only an idea, not a reality. 'Tis a shame. With the success of Game of Thrones on HBO, I have to imagine that a Pern movie or series would draw a decent audience.

Book Blogger Hop is hosted by Jennifer at Crazy for Books.

Bout of Books 5.0: summing it all up

Well, well, well. Another Bout of Books has come to an end. If one were to measure the Read-a-Thon solely on number of books completed or pages read, then this would certainly be at the top of the list. The first time I participated in a Bout of Books Read-a-Thon was in October 2011, for Bout of Books 2.0. I summarized that week saying, “All-in-all, I read 997 pages, finishing two books and getting more than 1/2 way through the third during the 7-day-long event.” I missed Bout of Books 3.0, but was right back into the fray for 4.0 in May of this year. During that week, I completed four books and part of a fifth; a total of 1203 pages.

My reading accomplishment for Bout of Books 5.0 was a grand total of 6 books completed and 1608 pages read. The only way I was able to read that much was that we were on holiday—a road trip from California to Texas—and I was able to read for long stretches as we drove half-way across the USA. I couldn't have planned it better!

But in addition to the amount of reading I was able to get done, there was even more going on for me this time. I was actively participating in the Twitter stream, easy enough via SMS text messaging on my cell phone. I also made it a point to visit 2 to 5 other blogs each night and leave comments. It's this social or “community” aspect which I find to be the very best part of this particular Read-a-Thon. And best of all, I sponsored a challenge on Day 1 of the Read-a-Thon.

It was a grand week and I was sad that it was all over. You can find my day-by-day summaries of the week just a little bit lower in this blog. I experimented with keeping all the updates in a single post, but next time I think I'll go back to daily posts. Best of all, I was totally successful in meeting the goals I had posted before the read-a-thon began. Bout of Books 5.0 was a total success!

Summary

Total number of books I read: 7
Total number of pages I read: 1608
Total number of books completed: 6

Explosive Eighteen by Janet Evanovich - completed 13 Aug
To Kill a Warlock by H P Mallory - completed 14 Aug
A Lesson in Secrets by Jacqueline Winspear - completed 15 Aug
Timeless by Gail Carriger - completed 15 Aug
The Mezzo Wore Mink by Mark Schweizer - completed 17 Aug
Creation in Death by J D Robb - completed 18 Aug
Fire Burn and Cauldron Bubble by H P Mallory - read 12 pages

Book Blogger Hop: 17-23 August 2012

As the weekend approaches, it's time for another Book Blogger Hop hosted by Jennifer at Crazy for Books. This week's question is:

What is the one genre you will NEVER read?

Never is a long, long time. Right now, I'd have to say business and economics books are unlikely to wind up on my bookshelves. I rarely read any non-fiction, though each year I do read one or two memoirs. I'm an eclectic reader and my preferences have changed from time to time. I tend to shy away from erotica and stereotypical romance novels. I do, however, enjoy the cross-over romances including suspense/mysteries and paranormals as long as there is a strong plot rather than the book just being a framework for the romance.

Bout of Books 5.0: My experience

Sunday, 12 August: I'm planning on keeping all the status about my Bout of Books participation right here in a single post. Since I'm on vacation, there may be a day or two when I find it difficult to get online and update. I posted my goals a couple of days ago. I've already started on one of the books that's on my list of prime reads for the read-a-thon. At this point, I'm already 62 pages into Explosive Eighteen by Janet Evanovich.

Monday, 13 August: I took Explosive Eighteen to bed with me and read until the batteries in my flashlight ran out. At midnight, I looked at the page number so that I could accurately report what was read during Bout of Books. I had read the first 180 pages before the start time for Bout of Books. I finished the book around 10:15 MDT today. Now I'm reading To Kill a Warlock by H P Mallory. I picked this up for my Kindle when it was offered as a freebie by the publisher. I'm now 76% through the book—on page 151 of 210— and should finish it sometime tomorrow. I had plenty of time to read today as we drove from Richfield, UT, to Vernal, UT. I took several hours away from reading when we visited Dinosaur National Monument this afternoon. And, I have to admit that most of my evening has been spent on the Internet instead of reading. Much of this time has been reading the backlog of Twitter messages and visiting blogs—all in the name of Bout of Books.

Tuesday, 14 August: Another day spent mostly on the highway. We drove from Vernal, UT, to Salida, CO. The scenery was magnificent most of the way. We even drove over the Continental Divide at least two times. I started the day off 59 pages from the end of To Kill a Warlock. I finished it around 10:15. (What is it with 10:15?) I immediately started reading A Lesson in Secrets by Jacqueline Winspear. This is the eighth book in her Maisie Dobbs series and I'm enjoying it very much. I'm updating around 9pm MDT and then I'm going to take the book to bed with me. Since I'm on page 260 (of 321), there's a high probability I'll finish it before midnight. If not, I know I'll complete it during breakfast tomorrow. I've also participated in some of the non-reading activities, including Twitter and visiting several blogs and leaving comments.

Wednesday, 15 August: I love spending the day in the car—hubby taking care of the driving and me just reading as much as I want. It was another long day as we drove from Salida, CO, to Amarillo, TX. I read the last 26 pages of A Lesson in Secrets before we packed up this morning and started reading Timeless by Gail Carriger during breakfast. By the time we arrived in Amarillo, I was on page 322 of 386 and I finished the book shortly before midnight. I still can't believe that Carriger has said that Timeless is to be the last book in the Parasol Protectorate. There's really so much more to tell. Perhaps she'll start a new series set in the same steampunk locale. At any rate, I've now read 1047 pages and finished four books since Bout of Books 5.0 began. Tomorrow I'm going to take a look at a couple of challenges.

Thursday, 16 August: Except for reading in bed early this morning, I didn't get much reading done today. I did start reading The Mezzo Wore Mink by Mark Schweizer—a mystery wrapped in comedy. But everything conspired against me having much time to read during the day. I'm visiting with a friend so it was more fun to visit with her than to be reading. And, I had major networking problems which kept me from getting online. Eventually, I went to the cell phone store and they were able to reset my cell phone so I could connect again. I've only posted a couple of tweets, but I did participate in one challenge today. By the time I get this blog updated, it will be past midnight and I'm going to take my book to bed.

Friday, 17 August: 'Twas the last day of long-distance driving for our vacation. Comparatively, it was a short drive of only 250 miles, but that again gave me several hours to read with no distractions. I started the morning about 22% of the way into The Mezzo Wore Mink by Mark Schweizer. Yes, I was reading it on my Kindle and this is one of those books which does not have the "real page numbers" feature. Since the paperback version of the book has 194 pages, I'm treating this as page 42—which means that I had read 152 pages by the time I finished the book shortly after lunch. I took an hour to update my reading lists and records, and then started reading Creation in Death by J D Robb. This book wasn't on the list of books which I originally included on my goals post, but it's one that I had in the car and which I wanted to read. We got home around 16:00 and I immediately set to unpacking and doing things at the house, along with relishing in the abundance of network bandwidth. Taking the book to bed with me around 22:30, I was on page 110 when I realized that I had read the same paragraph 7 or 8 times and decided to put the book away and turn off the light.

Saturday, 18 August: Now that we are back home, we also had to return to our normal schedule. On Saturdays, that means that I am taking care of my two grandchildren. This day, hubby went with me, so I was able to read in the car on the way down to their house (an hour away). If he hadn't gone with me, I'd have listened to an audio book. The net result was that I finished reading Creation in Death early in the evening. I spent the rest of the night browsing on the Internet—visiting #boutofbooks-er blogs and chatting on Twitter. And, we did watch the two episodes of True Blood which the DVR had recorded while we were out of town. I'll start a new book on Sunday morning.

Sunday, 19 August: If any day of the Read-a-Thon could be called a “fail” then it would have been Sunday, the last day of Bout of Books 5.0. That's because I simply did not make time to read. Perhaps it was because I started a new book and hadn't engaged. Perhaps it was that I was totally distracted with TV and Internet readily available. At any rate, I read only a dozen pages all day long. My number two son came to visit in the afternoon and brought his daughter—and you can imagine how much fun I had spending time with them. So by bedtime, I was on page 12 of Fire Burn and Cauldron Bubble by H P Mallory. Not much progress to add to the total.

Updates

Overall

Total number of books I've read: 7
Total number of pages I've read: 1608
Total number of books completed: 6

Challenges

Candy Challenge hosted by BookSmartie:
This week of Bout of Books, I've found myself eating Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. On Monday, I picked up a package of the Dark PB Cups and ate them for an afternoon snack. On Tuesday, I had an ice cream sundae for dessert at supper; it was made with PB cup ice cream and chocolate syrup. And then this afternoon, I had a PB cup cookie at Starbucks with my Tall Decaf Coffee Frappiccino. It's been a PB cup week all around!

Monday, August 13

Number of books I've read today: 2
Number of pages I've read today: 291
Number of books completed today: 1

Tuesday, August 14

Number of books I've read today: 2
Number of pages I've read today: 344
Number of books completed today: 1

Wednesday, August 15

Number of books I've read today: 2
Number of pages I've read today: 412
Number of books completed today: 2

Thursday, August 16

Number of books I've read today: 1
Number of pages I've read today: 42
Number of books completed today: 0

Friday, August 17

Number of books I've read today: 2
Number of pages I've read today: 262
Number of books completed today: 1

Saturday, August 18

Number of books I've read today: 1
Number of pages I've read today: 245
Number of books completed today: 1

Sunday, August 19

Number of books I've read today: 1
Number of pages I've read today: 12
Number of books completed today: 0

The Bout of Books read-a-thon is organized by Amanda @ On a Book Bender and Kelly @ Reading the Paranormal. It is a week long read-a-thon that begins 12:01am Monday, August 13th and runs through Sunday, August 19th in whatever time zone you are in. Bout of Books is low-pressure, and the only reading competition is between you and your usual number of books read in a week. There are challenges, giveaways, and a grand prize, but all of these are completely optional. For all Bout of Books 5.0 information and updates, be sure to visit the Bout of Books blog.

#SWUR & #OlympicReadathon: Final tally

I've had a grand time over the past 2+ weeks while participating in both the Summer Wrap-up Read-a-Thon and Random House of Canada's Olympic Readathon. These were normal work weeks and even on the weekends, I couldn't always spend a lot of time reading. Nevertheless, due to setting modest goals, I was able to achieve what I set out for.

The Olympic Readathon (#OlympicReadathon) ran for 17 days -- from the day of the opening ceremonies on July 27th until the closing event on August 12th. During that time, I read 2631 pages against a goal of 2500, completing 9 books.

The Summer Wrap-Up Read-a-thon (#SWUR) began on August 4th while #OlympicReadathon was going on and also ended on August 12th. I figured that if I was already participating in one read-a-thon, it wouldn't be too much trouble to tack on a second one. Well, when it came to reading, that was surely true. But I had overlooked the social aspects. I lost reading time due to taking time to hang out on Twitter and visit blogs—there were just so many participants. My one goal for #SWUR was to read A Call to Arms so I could return the borrowed book to my sister-in-law. I finished it on Sunday morning. In fact, it was one of four books I finished during the 9 day event.

Books finished during the first week of #OlympicReadathon:

Books completed during both #OlympicReadathon and #SWUR:

Books I read but have not [yet] finished:

Summary

Totals

#OlympicReadathon total pages: 2631
#OlympicReadathon total books: 9
#SWUR total pages: 1410
#SWUR total books: 4

Day by Day

Friday, 7/27
Number of pages I've read today: 138
Number of books completed today: 1

Saturday, 7/28
Number of pages I've read today: 278
Number of books completed today: 1

Sunday, 7/29
Number of pages I've read today: 318
Number of books completed today: 1

Monday, 7/30
Number of pages I've read today: 164
Number of books completed today: 1

Tuesday, 7/31
Number of pages I've read today: 11
Number of books completed today: 0

Wednesday, 8/1
Number of pages I've read today: 210
Number of books completed today: 1

Thursday, 8/2
Number of pages I've read today: 102
Number of books completed today: 0

Friday, 8/3
Number of pages I've read today: 100
Number of books completed today: 0

Saturday, 8/4
Number of pages I've read today: 161
Number of books completed today: 1

Sunday, 8/5
Number of pages I've read today: 20
Number of books completed today: 0

Monday, 8/6
Number of pages I've read today: 91
Number of books completed today: 0

Tuesday, 8/7
Number of pages I've read today: 100
Number of books completed today: 0

Wednesday, 8/8
Number of pages I've read today: 149
Number of books completed today: 1

Thursday, 8/9 Number of pages I've read today: 84
Number of books completed today: 0

Friday, 8/10
Number of pages I've read today: 111
Number of books completed today: 0

Saturday, 8/11
Number of pages I've read today: 66
Number of books completed today: 0

Sunday, 8/12
Number of pages I've read today: 628
Number of books completed today: 2