BTT: Mysteries

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

Do you read mystery novels? If so, why? Is it the mysteries themselves that appeal to you? The puzzle-solving? The murders? Or why don’t you read them? What about them doesn’t appeal?

Yeah, I read mysteries. In fact, the majority of books that I read each year are mysteries. So far this year, over half of the books I've read have been mysteries.

I think one reason why I read so many mysteries is because they tend to be published in series—sometimes very long series. I've stated that I really like long novels and series because they allow me to spend lots and lots of time with characters that I've come to like. I do lean toward cozy mysteries and historical mysteries rather than hard-boiled and procedural crime novels. I like a good story and well-developed, likeable characters and I try to avoid gory stories and those with strong psychologically “evil” characters. You won't catch me reading any of the “Hannibal Lector” books!

Here are some books from the mystery series that I've read this year:

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.

BTT: Pet Peeve

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

What are your literary “pet peeves”?

With the flood of self-published [electronic] books, my pet peeve is now the lack of editing before a book is released. Now don't get me wrong, it's not just self-published books that suffer from this problem—I'm finding it in books from mainstream publishers as well. I'll use as an example a book that I recently read, Sketch Me If You Can by Sharon Pape, published by Berkeley Prime Crime and purchased as a Kindle edition from Amazon. On page 95, I read: She picked up the the thin scrap of plastic. It wasn't as soft and flexible as the kind of wrap sold by the role in grocery stores and used in homes all over the country to store leftovers. Yes, “role” when the correct word is “roll”. Spellcheckers can't do it all for you—some human needs to read the book and note the needed corrections. This is one of the most egregious errors I found in the book, but by no means the only one.

My complaint about poorly edited books is that each time I run into such an error, it breaks the flow of the story. At the very least, I'm annoyed. If it has happened too frequently, I become angry and indignant. Unfortunately, this sloppiness can totally ruin an otherwise wonderful book. Someone who is self-publishing has no one to blame but herself. An author whose books are distributed through a well-established publisher deserves better. And the publisher who failed the author deserves a smaller cut of the book's sales.

This prompt comes from Bookish Sarah who posed this question in response to a query from Deb in which her final question was, “What question have I NOT asked at BTT that you’d love me to ask?” Deb liked many of the questions that were shared with her and from time to time she asks the rest of us to respond to them. Like now.

BTT: Hard

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

What’s the hardest/most challenging book you’ve ever read? Was it worth the effort? Did you read it by choice or was it an assignment/obligation?

I'm having a really hard time coming up with an answer to this question. I guess the "hardest" book I've read recently was The Warden by Anthony Trollope. And it wasn't really *hard*. It's more that the style of writing was so different from the recreational reading that I am more used to. If I had approached this book back when I was in school, it wouldn't have been any problem at all as I was accustomed to reading the classics.

I'd have to say that reading this book was definitely worth it. I set myself the challenge of reading several classics each year and chose Trollope as the author I'd focus on for a while. After researching the author and his bibliography, I decided I'd start with his best-loved works, collectively known as the Chronicles of Barsetshire. Since this series of 6 novels starts with The Warden, that's where I started. It took me a long time because other books were beckoning, but I did finish it in March of this year.

BTT: Cheating

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

Do you cheat and peek at the ends of books? (Come on, be honest.)

Before I sat down to write my answer, I read the first 6 or so responses to today's question. Interestingly, a couple of people seemed to react the same way that I did to the question. To answer the question as asked, I have to admit that I rarely jump to the back of the book. I have done so once or twice, but it is very rare that I will look ahead.

But my reaction to the question is to bristle a bit at the negative implication that peeking at the end of a book would constitute “cheating”. Unless you're reading a book for a course and your instructor has forbidden you to read ahead of the rest of the students so that everyone will have exactly the same knowledge of the story so far when it comes to assignments or class discussions, then what would it matter if you read the last couple of the pages of the book out of order? Would the poser of the question consider it “cheating” if you read a review of the book? What about reading reviews (or even the book jackets) of subsequent books in a series?

I agree with the other bloggers who have commented that reading isn't a competitive sport where the playing field has to be absolutely even. Nope. Reading is entertainment. I feel free to pick up the remote control and fast-forward through a movie and I feel the same freedom to skim passages, or skip ahead in a book that I'm reading. I'm not accountable to anyone but myself for how I read and I don't have a rule that says I must read every word in the order they appear in the book.

BTT: Something Old, Something New

It's Thursday, so that means it's time for another Booking Through Thursday prompt. This week, bloggers are asked:

All other things being equal–do you prefer used books? Or new books? (The physical speciman, that is, not the title.) Does your preference differentiate between a standard kind of used book, and a pristine, leather-bound copy?

I'm basically cheap. I prefer used books—second-hand, half-price, BookMooched, and swapped. Most books I'm only going to read one time, so if I read a used book, it has cost me quite a bit less. And, because I actively swap books, I pass along my books (after reading) to someone else.

When searching for the right link to use to Amazon's used book Marketplace, Google took me to a lot of sites—including Amazon—with information on selling and buying used textbooks. Which started me thinking about my textbooks back when I was a student. I always bought a new book if it was available, and I tried to sell my books back to the bookstore, griping about how little they were willing to pay me for my book. When it came to textbooks, I really didn't want any else's notes, highlighting, or underlining taking my attention from the text itself. And, I rarely marked in my books, so whomever was lucky enough to buy one of my second-hand ones got a good deal indeed.

I have a couple of books that I have tagged as “Permanent Collection“, but I haven't purposely bought brand-new books just because I plan on keeping them. The basic consideration is the condition of the book. And, I'm counting on being able to find another copy if I ever need to replace one of those books.

As I commented when I posted this link over at Booking Through Thursday, “For me, it’s all about the story, not the package that the story is in. I buy used in preference to new, and electronic if that’s cheaper than used.”

BTT: Series

It's Thursday, so that means it's time for another Booking Through Thursday prompt. This week, bloggers are asked:

If you read series, do you ever find a series “jumping the shark?” How do you feel about that?

And, do you keep reading anyway?

I read series. I read lots of series. Right now, I can't think of a series where I've seen a definitive “jump the shark” episode. But if I run into one, I will not have a problem abandoning the series—particularly if I feel the stories are deteriorating, though it will probably take a couple of books for me to come to the decision that I'm not going to continue reading it.

I've said many times that I often decide what to read by what mood I'm in. This means that I will often step away from a series for quite some time before I return to it. Sometimes this is necessitated by the discrepancy between how fast I read and how slowly the publishers bring out books in a series. I read so many series that I have found it necessary to keep a master of list of the series I'm reading and my exact position in the on-going series so that I don't inadvertently buy a book that I've already read.

One other peculiarity is that I don't like to read series books out of order. Where this has become painful is with the free or deeply discounted eBooks that publishers have been giving away for the past year or so. I've got Persuader by Lee Child, the seventh in his Jack Reacher mystery series sitting on my Kindle, waiting until I can read books 2-6 and catch up to this point in the series and continue. Likewise, I picked up The Last Camel Died at Noon by Elizabeth Peters, sixth in her Amelia Peabody series, and I still need to read 2-5. And I was happy to take advantage of a “buy one, get one free” offer for Kitty and the Dead Man's Hand and Kitty Raises Hell, numbers 5 and 6 in Carrie Vaughn's Kitty Norville series. If I didn't already have so many books on hand which need to be read, I might just stock up on either Kindle editions or used paperbacks. But, I'm trying to be somewhat restrained in my book buying ...

BTT: Current

Laura is repeating a question from some time ago, but as she points out, for avid readers, the answer is continually changing.

What are you reading right now? What made you choose it? Are you enjoying it? Would you recommend it? (And, by all means, discuss everything, if you’re reading more than one thing!)

I try to keep the home page up to date with the books I'm currently reading. Even when I'm taking a break from blogging, I still update the home page regularly. So, if you take a look today, you'll see this:

Currently Reading

I only have space for four book covers in this section, so even if I'm reading more than four books at once—and yes that occurs from time to time—I'll list the four most "active" reads.

The first book in my list is The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown. I'm listening to this book on unabridged CDs. Since the only time that I listen to it is when I'm alone in the car, I expect it will take me months and months to finish reading this book. I'm currently on disk 8 of 15, so I guess that means I'm about midway into the book. I'm enjoying it, and even though I have a print copy of the book available, I really like the reader, Paul Michael, so I'm going to stick with the audio book. I originally picked this book when I saw the CDs at the public library. It was taking me so long to read through the book—at most one or two disks on any day—that I returned the audio book to the library and picked up a used copy at the local recycled book store.

I'm an eBook junkie. (After reading any of my posts, does this come as a surprise?) So, on my Blackberry, I have David Weber's Field of Dishonor, fourth book in his Honor Harrington series. I purchased this book from Baen's online Webscriptions store. Reading on the Blackberry isn't something that I'll do for a sustained period of time. Rather, it provides me with very convenient access to a book at times when it might not be easy to pull out a paper or electronic book. It's probably obvious that I picked this book because I'm reading my way through the series and this is how far I've gotten so far.

For at least six months I've had a copy of The Warden by Anthony Trollope loaded on my Kindle. I'm somewhere in chapter 5 (of 21), but it's been quite some time since I read anything in this book, so I'm going to have to back up and do some re-reading to get myself back into the story. Trollope's writing is quite different from contemporary authors and requires me to pay more attention as I'm reading. I set myself a goal of reading at least two of Trollope's novels this year, so I need to buckle down and spend some serious time in Barsetshire. I have to rave about the version of this book that I'm reading. I downloaded it from MobileRead, and it is a very high quality eBook—much more so that some commercially produced books that I've purchased.

And the final book in my active list is Reap the Wild Wind, first in Julie Czerneda's Stratification trilogy. I am a real fan of Czerneda's books and I own a paperback copy of this book as well as a copy I purchased for the Kindle. I'm in the middle of chapter six and since this book is also on my Kindle, I'm going to have to resist the pull of this book on my flight home tonight and keep my focus on making progress through the Trollope novel.

BTT: Long and Short of It

It's Thursday and time again to look at what Laura at Booking Through Thursday suggests for a blog post this week. For me, it's a very easy question:

Which do you prefer? Short stories? Or full-length novels?

There's no question about it. I definitely prefer full-length novels over short stories. I figure that after I've invested time and attention—and maybe even affection—on the characters, I want the story to go on for a long time. In most cases, the longer the better.

Next best to big books, aka “Chunksters”, are series. Some of the series that I am currently enjoying are the Stephanie Plum mysteries by Janet Evanovich, Sookie Stackhouse vampire novels by Charlaine Harris, and Number 1 Ladies' Detective Agency mysteries by Alexander McCall Smith.

I'm so much a fan of thick books, two years ago, I signed up for the “Chunkster Challenge”, challenged to read at least four books during the year with at least 450 pages each.

BTT: Bedside

Once again, Laura at Booking Through Thursday, has posed a question to the blogging & reading community. By the end of the day, some 30 to 70 bloggers will have posted their own replies and linked their blog posts to hers.

Laura asks:

What books do you have next to your bed right now? How about other places in the house? What are you reading?

Well, to be honest, although I read in bed, I rarely leave any books there when I get up in the morning. Instead, I carry my book with me to the other parts of the house or on my day's travels so that I can read whenever the opportunity arises. There is a book in the headboard of my bed at home, though. It's July's People by Nadine Gordimer, which I have promised to send to Rocky who won it in last fall's Afrika Swap at BookObsessed.

July's People tells the story of the liberal (and white) Smales family who, when full-scale war between the races breaks out in South Africa, are rescued by their servant, July, who leads them to refuge in his village. This novel appealed to me when researching and looking for a book set in Africa for the swap. Gordimer was awarded the Nobel Prize in literature 10 years after the publication of July's People. I'm only a small way into the book so far, but I am finding her description of how apartheid might end in all-out violence a chilling vision, indeed.

I had intended to pick this book up off the headboard when I left home Monday morning (at 6am!), but forgot it. Fortunately, I had lots of other books with me to take its place.

In my backpack here in San Antonio, I have my Kindle with numerous books on it, including Crocodile on the Sandbank by Elizabeth Peters. Early in May, I discovered that Amazon.com was offering a special price for this book, first in Peters' series starring Amelia Peabody, a Victorian feminist who heads out to Egypt to excavate mummies and winds up using her sleuthing skills to help solve a murder or two. The series is up to 18 volumes now, and if I enjoy this book as much as I think I will, there will be future purchases—not necessarily all in Kindle format—as I read my way through the series.

See yesterday's post for more about the books that I'm reading. And yes, I did say “books”, plural. I can't remember a time when I was only reading one book at a time. I'm well practiced in the art of reading several books simultaneously. Sometimes one book is so compelling that I concentrate on it to the exclusion of others that I might have started reading, but I return to those as soon as I've finished reading the first.

BTT: Influence

It's Thursday, and Laura at Booking Through Thursday, has posed another question for us.

Are your book choices influenced by friends and family? Do their recommendations carry weight for you? Or do you choose your books solely by what you want to read?

My book selection is definitely influenced by friends and family as well as people I've run into online who blog about books and post online reviews. These particularly affect the aquisition phase of the process. I'll buy books or swap for them based on my wishlist. Books get added to the wishlist for many reasons—not the least of which are recommendations from people whose opinions I trust.

One reason why I enjoy my participation in the swaps and virtual book boxes at BookObsessed is because the interactions involve discussions on why certain books were selected for the swap. These become implicit recommendations. Whichever book I wind up winning in the swap goes into my TBR, but I also often wind up putting any number of the offered books onto my wishlist for a future acquisition.

For the execution phase, I'm much more likely to select which book I will read next based on what mood I happen to be in. Heck, since I often am reading more than one book at a time, my mood will often influence which of the books I'll pick up at any given time.

BTT: Half

Over at Booking Through Thursday, Laura has asked:

So … you’re halfway through a book and you’re hating it. It’s boring. It’s trite. It’s badly written. But … you’ve invested all this time to reading the first half.

What do you do? Read the second half? Just to finish out the story? Find out what happens?

Or, cut your losses and dump the second half?

Once upon a time, I felt compelled to finish each and every book that I started. It might take me a long time if I wasn't enjoying it because I'm perfectly willing to set a book aside or even keep a couple of books going at the same time. (In fact, I'm currently reading both Hex Marks the Spot by Madelyn Alt and Dead Witch Walking by Kim Harrison.) But, after one totally disastrous experience, I've stepped back from that position.

'Twas a number of years ago when I started reading Lord Foul's Bane by Stephen R. Donaldson. If you're not familiar with this book, it's the first book in the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever. The series had been given glowing reviews and I was looking forward to a great fantasy novel. Instead, I met Thomas Covenant—a totally dispicable character who not only has deplorable behavior, but who also whines and whinges all through the book. I kept plodding through, thinking, “Surely, this will get better.” But I got all the way to the end of the book and I had not enjoyed a single moment of the reading. In fact, I really wanted my time back.

Since reading Lord Foul's Bane, I'm no longer timid to abandon a book that I'm not enjoying. I do tend to keep track of how far I got in the book before I set it aside—just in case I later decide to give it another try. I suppose that deciding to do that will depend on the level of dislike. If I truly hate the book, I'm probably never going to pick it up again. If it's a milder level of dislike, I am honest enough with myself to know that I have to be ‘in the mood’ to read certain types of books. So, I might be more inclined to enjoy a particular book at a later date.

BTT: Too Short?

When I first looked at this week's Booking Through Thursday prompt, I thought the question “Too Short?” referred to the length of a book. Instead, it asks, “Do you read everything all the way through or do you feel life really is too short to read bad books?”. Deb also says, “I’d always heard that, but I still read books through until the end no matter how bad they were because I had this sense of obligation.” and I can definitely identify with that sense of obligation.

In one of my earlier BTT posts I tell about forcing myself to finish reading Lord Foul's Bane by Stephen Donaldson, even though I was hating it. I concluded “While I couldn't get that time back, I did decide that I would no longer consider it a failure if I abandoned a book part-way through. It's rare that I give up on a book. I have been known to set one aside for a very long time and eventually return to it. But when I just know I can't find anything to enjoy in the book and I'm not interested in any of the sequels, I'm now willing to just admit I picked a book that isn't going to work for me and move on.”

In fact, I do keep a list of books that I've started but not finished reading, and why I didn't finish it. Where I can, I also record the page or chapter where I abandoned the book. This will help me find my place if I later decide to pick up the book and finish it.

BTT: Niche

This week's prompt at Booking Through Thursday, asks:

“There are certain types of books that I more or less assume all readers read. (Novels, for example.)

But then there are books that only YOU read. Instructional manuals for fly-fishing. How-to books for spinning yarn. How to cook the perfect souffle. Rebuilding car engines in three easy steps. Dog training for dummies. Rewiring your house without electrocuting yourself. Tips on how to build a NASCAR course in your backyard. Stuff like that.

What niche books do YOU read?”

Would you believe that I can't think of a thing? I read very few non-fiction books and even very few magazines. But I do read lots and lots of novels. The majority of the books that I read are mysteries (cozy and hard), science fiction, and fantasy. Actually, fantasy is a fairly new genre for me. At some time in the lost-from-memory past, I must have run across a fantasy novel that I didn't enjoy—probably a swords-and-sorcery type— and disliked it enough that I blamed the whole genre rather than that particular book. But, after encouragement at BookObsessed, I picked up a couple of recommended books and I'm now making up for lost time.

Two other genres have been added to my menu because of the folks at BookObsessed: PUF (paranormal and urban fantasy) and Historical Fiction. And, with both of these, there are a lot of very good books available from the used book stores. While I have to plop down top dollar for the newest book from Janet Evanovich or Orson Scott Card, I can satisfy myself picking up the backlist from PUF authors like Charlaine Harris and Kim Harrison or historical fiction writers such as Sarah Dunant and Philippa Gregory.

So, unfortunately, while this week's Booking Through Thursday prompt didn't really apply to me and my reading, it did prod me to think about the types of books that I've been reading.

BTT: Sticky

Over at Booking Through Thursday, Laura posted this week's prompt: “This can be a quick one. Don’t take too long to think about it. Fifteen books you’ve read that will always stick with you. First fifteen you can recall in no more than 15 minutes.”

Well, well. This isn't going to be easy, because I tend to forget details shortly after I finish the last page of a book. I'll remember whether I liked it or not and I may remember the basic theme or plot, but I'm not going to be able to give a detailed summary even a day or two after I've finished reading the book. I'm sure that even after I list fifteen books, there are going to be many others that are more deserving to be tagged as “unforgettable”.

1. A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller, Jr.
2. Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein
3. The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula Le Guin
4. Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card
5. A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle
6. A Severed Wasp by Madeleine L'Engle
7. The No 1 Ladies' Detective Agency by Alexander McCall Smith
8. Full of Grace by Dorothea Benton Frank
9. The Harrad Experiment by Robert H. Rimmer
10. Little Women by Louisa Mae Alcott
11. Pollyanna by Eleanor H. Porter
12. Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder
13. Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe
14. Cry, the Beloved Country by Alan Paton
15. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

Whew! Did it. And, that's it until next week's Booking Through Thursday.

BTT: Unread

Though I'm late in responding to this week's Booking Through Thursday prompt, I really wanted to reply to the question asking “Is there a book that you wish you could “unread”? One that you disliked so thoroughly you wish you could just forget that you ever read it?”

Indeed! Not only have I read one that I simply hated, but that experience finally taught me that not all books have to be finished. I can't remember how long ago it was, but following recommendations from people that I respected, I picked up a copy of Lord Foul's Bane by Stephen Donaldson, the first book in the Chronicles of Thomas Covenant the Unbeliever. Thomas Covenant is the most unlikeable lead character that I have ever encountered. Yes, there have been despicable villains in many of the books I have read, but Covenant is supposed to be the ‘hero’—or rather the ‘anti-hero’ of this series.

So, I hated the main character and got really annoyed by his whinging throughout the book. He just kept moaning and complaining about all the bad things in his life, and there was nothing likable about him. But, I kept thinking, “Surely it will get better. Too many people said this was a good book.” But it didn't get better and when I read the last page, I felt like my time had been stolen from me.

While I couldn't get that time back, I did decide that I would no longer consider it a failure if I abandoned a book part-way through. It's rare that I give up on a book. I have been known to set one aside for a very long time and eventually return to it. But when I just know I can't find anything to enjoy in the book and I'm not interested in any of the sequels, I'm now willing to just admit I picked a book that isn't going to work for me and move on.

BTT: Book Gluttony

In last week's Booking Through Thursday prompt, participants are asked to respond to this question: “Book Gluttony! Are your eyes bigger than your book belly? Do you have a habit of buying up books far quicker than you could possibly read them? Have you had to curb your book buying habits until you can catch up with yourself? Or are you a controlled buyer, only purchasing books when you have run out of things to read?”

Oh my gosh! Am I ever guilty of book gluttony, particularly when I have a chance to pick up an eBook for free or nearly free. I am not shy to admit that I have a humongous TBR stack—actually one stack 4 feet high and two full bookcases. And that's just the books printed on paper. I'm now just as guilty of collecting electronic books for my Kindle and Sony readers. When I first bought my Kindle, I went out and downloaded many (MANY ... err MANY) public domain and creative commons books formatted for the Kindle. I've done the same for the Sony reader. But I'm also guilty of downloaded every free book I've been offered by Amazon.com and the eBook Store at Sony. I've downloaded books offered by the authors from their web sites. I can honestly say that I could be totally cut off from book stores and the Internet and I have enough books to keep me busy reading for at least two years.

I even have accepted the free books that aren't really the kind of books that I currently enjoy reading. In conjunction with their 60th birthday celebration, Harlequin Books gave away 16 romance titles. I downloaded them in various formats directly from the Harlequin web site, but I also downloaded them in Kindle format when the offer was extended through Amazon.com. Now I have them ready to read on the Kindle and I won't have to bother with any format shifting of the versions I downloaded from Harlequin's site. I read very little of this type of romance novel, but I figured I didn't want to pass up the free books because some day in the future they may be just exactly what I want to read and then I'll have them readily available.

I actually do something similar with paper books and that's why I have such a large TBR stack. I'm an active book swapper at BookObsessed and I exchange from 4 to 10 books a month with like-minded readers. Sometimes I choose a book that I'm not ready to read and then it will go into my TBR stack until the spirit moves me and I pull it out to enjoy. Then, I swap it onward for another book. J and I enjoy many of the same books—well, I wish I could interest her in SF/F and she wishes I read more romance, but if you compare our reading lists you'll see that there are a lot of books in common. And then my mother-in-law shares books with me. She's likely to read many of the books I've received in swaps and I do have to admit that she's responsible for introducing me to Nora Roberts and Dorothea Benton Frank.

Moderation is not a word often applied to me, and especially not when it comes to books and reading. Fortunately, I don't feel that “gluttony” is such a bad word when applied to something that is so enjoyable and so good for me too.

BTT: Best books of 2008

This week's Booking Through Thursday prompt asks “It’s a week or two later than you’d expect, and it may be almost a trite question, but … what were your favorite books from 2008?”

Now this is a different perspective on “Best Books of 2008”. At BookObsessed, I posted these as the best books I had read during 2008:

• Little Brother by Cory Doctorow
• Full of Grace by Dorothea Benton Frank
• The Ruby Ring by Diane Haeger
• The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett
• Soul Identity by Dennis Batchelder

I've made no attempt to rank these against each other. They were simply the very best books that I read all year. They are books that I gladly recommend. The two that were in paper (Full of Grace and The Ruby Ring) have already been swapped and mailed to other readers. Unfortunately, I can't do the same with the electronic books, though I should point out that Little Brother is freely available via download from Doctorow's web site. It was also released with a Creative Commons copyright that allows its distribution, so you can download copies formatted for various electronic readers from MobileRead and Feedbooks. I also wrote short reviews of Little Brother and Soul Identity.

Now, if I take the prompt literally and look at my favorite books of the year, then I'd have to add a couple that aren't in the same class as best books.

• Bishop Special Crimes series by Kay Hooper

I signed up for a bookring circulating the nine books in this series. The first two books, Stealing Shadows and Hiding in the Shadows arrived in February and I was immediately hooked. The last three books arrived in November and I quickly read them to get them on the way to the next reader in the ring.

• Stealing Shadows
• Hiding in the Shadows
• Out of the Shadows
• Touching Evil
• Whisper of Evil
• Sense of Evil
• Hunting Fear
• Chill of Fear
• Sleeping with Fear

• Twilight series by Stephenie Meyer

Another guilty pleasure I indulged this year was reading PUF (Paranormal and Urban Fiction). It's a genre I had not explored prior to 2008, but I'm really enjoying most of the books I've been reading. Many of these books are romances, and the Twilight series was aimed at a young adult audience. These particular books were all the rage and after hearing about them for a while, I plunged in and read them quickly, purchasing the last in the series a day or two after the publication date. I topped off my Twilight experience by going to see the movie with my sister and her daughters over Thanksgiving weekend.

• Twilight
• New Moon
• Eclipse
• Breaking Dawn

BTT: What’s Sitting on Your Shelf?

This week's Booking Through Thursday prompt asks "What tomes are waiting patiently on your shelves?"

My TBR stack takes up four shelves in a bookcase and has overflowed into stacks on the floor. This picture shows the bookcase and the stacks as they were in February. Those stacks are now waist high and I've added a fourth.

So what are all those books? Many of the books are those that I've traded for over at BookObsessed which I will read and then either swap or give away. My first swap at BO was for the first five books in the Weather Warren series by Rachel Caine. I later swapped for the sixth book and therefore I have all six of them sitting here to read. I also have the fourth through sixth books in Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series. I read the first three in this series late last year. I'm hesitating on starting back into the series because the books are so long! (1070, 1443, and 1439 pages respectively.)

Jaime comes over and raids my bookshelves from time to time, so the books are getting read. I also share my books with my mother-in-law, so most of the time, she's already read the books by the time I get around to them.

I keep saying that I could be housebound for at least six months before I'd need to buy or swap for another book. I can definitely identify with Christopher Schoppa, whose article in the Washington Post instigated this prompt. "...I’m constantly distracted by the recent, just published and soon to be published works."