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August Wrap Up

04 Sep

First, I want to mention that I have temporarily stopped accepting review books and tour stops.  I won’t reject unsolicited books that appear on my doorstep, but I’m trying hard to back off accepting commitments.

I’d originally been thinking this would be through December.  Now I’m thinking I’ll accept a few commitments for November and December just to keep me moving!

My mailbox is sad, and my Mailbox Monday posts (or lack thereof) reflect this, but I think it will be good to catch up a little.

So, on to books read in August:

Paper Books

  1. Murder Most Persuasive (Elizabeth Parker Mystery #3) by Tracy Kiely
  2. The Revealers by Doug Wilhelm 
  3. Devotion: A Memoir by Dani Shapiro
  4. The Urban Fantasy Anthology by Peter S. Beagle (Editor), Joe R. Lansdale (Editor)
  5. Domestic Violets by Matthew Norman 
  6. Goodie One Shoes by Roz Siegel 
  7. Money Can’t Buy Love by Connie Briscoe 
  8. How I Made It to Eighteen: A Mostly True Story by Tracy White

Audio Books

  1. Her Royal Spyness (Her Royal Spyness Mysteries #1) by Rhys Bowen
  2. Persuasion by Jane Austen
  3. Kitty Takes a Holiday (Kitty Norville #3) by Carrie Vaughn
  4. Storm Front (The Dresden Files #1) by Jim Butcher 
  5. To Say Nothing of the Dog: Or How We Found the Bishop’s Bird Stump at Last by Connie Willis
  6. We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson
  7. Agent to the Stars by John Scalzi
  8. Chasing Fire by Nora Roberts

I was shocked to discover how many books I’d read, and even more than that, how many reviews I wrote.  I’ve been sick for going on 3 weeks now, and I was really knocked out for the first two.  I must have really been on fire for the first half of the month– 16 books read, 11 reviews written.  I made some real progress on catching up my review backlog as well!

So, my reading totals for the year stand at 122 books read: 51 paper books, 58 audio books, 11 Nook books,  1 other e-book, and 1 book in multiple formats.

My favorite book of the month would be Domestic Violets, with an honorable mention to my re-listen to a favorite, To Say Nothing of the Dog.

Plans going forward? Book club books, getting caught up, more books I read simply because I want to.  I’m really planning to get back to an audiobook review every Friday, and one or two print book reviews each week.

How was your August?  What are your September reading plans?

 
3 Comments

Posted by on September 4, 2011 in books, summary

 

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August Wrap-up

01 Sep

However you look at it, August was a good reading month, with many books read, lots were good and some were amazing.

Books read:

Books on paper:

Books on my Nook:

  • (5 stars) Mockingjay (Hunger Games #3) by Suzanne Collins (link is to my not a review, review coming soon)
  • (3.5 stars) Crazy for Love by Victoria Dahl
  • (3.5 stars) Chosen by Chandra Hoffman

Books on my MP3 player:

  • (5 stars) Mockingjay (Hunger Games #3) by Suzanne Collins (see above)
  • (3.5 stars) Full Bloom (Full Series #5) by Janet Evanovich, Charlotte Hughes
  • (4.5 stars) Dreams Underfoot (Newford, #1) by Charles de Lint
  • (4 stars) Desperate Duchesses (Desperate Duchesses #1) by Eloisa James
  • (4 stars) The Island by Elin Hilderbrand
  • (4.5 stars) The Mystery of Grace by Charles de Lint
  • (3 stars) Bitten (Women of the Otherworld #1) by Kelley Armstrong
  • (4 stars) Enthusiasm by Polly Shulman

That’s 9 books on paper, 3 books on my Nook, and 8 audiobooks this month, for a total of 19 books this month (yes, I realize that math doesn’t work– I read Mockingjay on my Nook as well as listened to it, so I’m counting it in both categories, but only counting it as one book total. I’ve read a total of 122 books this year (64 paper,  9 Nook, 50 audio)!  I also listened to parts of Thirteen Reasons Why in preparation for my book club meeting, and have one audiobook that I abandoned and am unsure as to whether I will return.

The quality this month was also high.  Mockingjay and Last Night I Sang to the Monster were my top books of the month, but If I Stay would easily have made that pick most months this year, and The Cookbook Collector and The Mystery of Grace both would have been in the running at least some to the time.  Interestingly, the first 3 are all Young Adult (YA) books– The 6 YA books I read is higher number than usual for me, and I’m glad that mood hit me this month.

However, the run of YA books I read has some bearing on a less pleasant trend in last month’s reading.  Six books I read (4 of them YA) had terrible things happening to children or teens as a significant part of the book.   Four more had it as a side plot or passing occurrence.  I’m really hoping to avoid this for a while, now!

I published 14 reviews this month, same as last month and similar to June, so that seems to be a stable number for me. I’ll continue to refine my process for choosing what books get reviewed.  I admit, there are books I enjoy more knowing that I don’t need to figure out what to say about them.  I would like to review more audiobooks next month.

Coming up:

I’m planning to read The Life  You’ve Imagined by Kristina Riggle to discuss on Devourer of Books next week.  I’m reading her other book, Real Life and Liars, for one of my book clubs toward the end of the month.  My other book club will be reading/discussing The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot.  For a TLC tour, I’ll be reading Coming Home and Home Again by Mariah Stewart.  Who knows what else, beyond those!

September presents a challenge for me, in that it is the start of a new TV season.  I like TV, but cut way down on my viewing over the summer.  I haven’t been missing it, but do I want to check out all of the new shows that might be interesting?   I usually would.  This could cut down on my reading time!  I’m not going to stress over it, either way.

I hope you enjoyed your August reading, and that September is even better.

 
5 Comments

Posted by on September 1, 2010 in books, summary

 

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August Wrap-up

31 Aug

j043481017 books read this month! Woo-hoo!

7 of those were audiobooks, 10 were paper.   That puts me at 87 books for the year, 35 of those audiobooks.  I’m a little behind on reviews, but if I have a review posted, it is linked to the book’s name.

Audio:

Paper:

My favorites were The Gift of an Ordinary Day, Olive Kitteridge, and Looking for Alaska (probably in that order).

Challenges:

everythingausten3First is the Everything Austen challenge at Stephanie’s Written Word.  I’m caught up!  I checked off 2 out of 6 items for it:  My reviews of the audiobook of An Assembly Such as This by Pamela Aidan and the 1972 BBC production of Emma. Unfortunately, neither was a rousing success for me, but I’m still enthusiastic about continuing with the challenge.  (End date 1/1/10)

Sookie StackhouseThe next challenge was the  Sookie Stackhouse challenge at Beth Fish Reads.  I’m now done with 3 of the 9 books that I need to read to complete it.  I added Club Dead this month.  I would have added one more, but I discovered that Netlibrary has books 1-3 and 5-9, but not #4.  I went ahead and bought a paper copy, and started reading Dead to the World today.  (Ends July 2010)

Giveaways:

I currently have a giveaway up for The Gift of an Ordinary Day by Katrina Kenison, which ends on September 10.  I’ll be posting a giveaway for How to Tame a Modern Rogue by Diana Holquist on Tuesday, and it should run until September 22.  I’ve got a couple of others in the works, so keep your eyes on my sidebar!

Upcoming:

This month, I am committed to reading:

  • Babydoll by Allyson Roy (TLC Book tours,  September 10)
  • 31 Hours by Masha Hamilton (Unbridled Books, week of September 14)
  • A Note From an Old Acquaintance by Bill Walker (Pump Up Your Book blog Tour, September 22)
  • Second Honeymoon by Joanna Trollope (Book Club L, late September)
  • The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield (Book Club M, October 5)

I’ve got a backlog of review books that I’m trying to work my way through.  Counting the first 4 Betsy-Tacy books as one, my count stands at 18 books that I  have received for review and haven’t read yet.  4 of those have specific dates (tours), the rest I just want to get to in a timely manner (that may be too late for some of them).

I plan on working down my review book backlog (I want to emphasize that everything there is something I want to read), and maybe get to a few other books on my shelf.  I’ll make progress on both challenges. I’ll be downloading Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins and starting to listen as soon as it is available.

I strongly suspect my reading total will plummet as the fall TV season starts.  I usually like to check out all the shows I used to watch, even occasionally, as well as try any new show that seems to have promise.  We have multiple DVRs hard at work, so I can record a LOT of shows.

I hope you had a good August, and have a better September.

 
6 Comments

Posted by on August 31, 2009 in books, summary

 

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