Category: The Book Fort

“Monday’s Minutes” is a weekly post in which I track my bookish life.  All book covers are linked to Goodreads unless otherwise noted.

Current Reads:

• Inkdeath by Cornelia Funke
• The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice – for the Never-Ending Anne Rice Reading Challenge.
• The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente
• Serafina and the Black Cloak by Robert Beatty
• The Fangirl Life by Kathleen Smith

 

 

Finished:

• Mother Ocean, Daughter Sea by Diana Marcellas
• Let’s Pretend this Never Happened by Jenny Lawson
• Alice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
• Emissary by Thomas Locke
• Billy Lovecraft Saves the World by Billy Lovecraft

  

 

DNF:

• Escape From Netherworld by David Kuklis
• Sadie Sugarspear and the Weeping Willow by Nicole Arlyn

 

Challenges:

• Show Your Shelves Some Love: 20 out of 51

Total pages read: 1285

Total # of books for the year: 25.  I’ve got a lot of reviews to write, thanks to Bout of Books 16 🙂

My Top Commenter: Thank you to everyone who stopped by during Bout of Books or to cheer me on for #FitReaders 🙂

What are you reading this week?

“Monday’s Minutes” is a weekly post in which I track my bookish life.  All book covers are linked to Goodreads unless otherwise noted.
Current Reads:

• Inkdeath by Cornelia Funke
• The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice – for the Never-Ending Anne Rice Reading Challenge.
• The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente
• Mother Ocean, Daughter Sea by Diana Marcellas
• Let’s Pretend this Never Happened by Jenny Lawson

  

 

DNF:

• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith – I just couldn’t handle this kind of story right now.  I might try again someday.

Challenges:

• Show Your Shelves Some Love: 15 out of 51

Total pages read: 227

Total # of books for the year: 20.  I’m in the process of reworking my daily routine to prioritize what is most important to me.  I’m trying once again to save the bulk of my email reading and use of social media to Saturdays so that I can use my breaks at work for exercising and the little bit of free time after work for writing and reading.  So far, I’ve only implemented using my breaks to go walking, since Bout of Books starts today.  Next week might be a little light on posts since I won’t be writing anything except my daily updates this week, but after that, I hope to have at least one review posted.
What are you reading this week?

“Monday’s Minutes” is a weekly post in which I track my bookish life.  All book covers are linked to Goodreads unless otherwise noted.

Current Reads:

• Inkdeath by Cornelia Funke
• The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice – for the Never-Ending Anne Rice Reading Challenge.
• The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente
• Mother Ocean, Daughter Sea by Diana Marcellas
• Let’s Pretend this Never Happened by Jenny Lawson

  

 

DNF:

• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith – I just couldn’t handle this kind of story right now.  I might try again someday.

Challenges:

• Show Your Shelves Some Love: 15 out of 51

Total pages read: 227

Total # of books for the year: 20.  I’m in the process of reworking my daily routine to prioritize what is most important to me.  I’m trying once again to save the bulk of my email reading and use of social media to Saturdays so that I can use my breaks at work for exercising and the little bit of free time after work for writing and reading.  So far, I’ve only implemented using my breaks to go walking, since Bout of Books starts today.  Next week might be a little light on posts since I won’t be writing anything except my daily updates this week, but after that, I hope to have at least one review posted.

What are you reading this week?

“Monday’s Minutes” is a weekly post in which I track my bookish life.  All book covers are linked to Goodreads unless otherwise noted.

Current Reads:

• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith – for the Classic Club Spin.
• Inkdeath by Cornelia Funke
• The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice – for the Never-Ending Anne Rice Reading Challenge.
• The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente
• Mother Ocean, Daughter Sea by Diana Marcellas

  

 

Finished:

• The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

Challenges:

• Show Your Shelves Some Love: 15 out of 51

Total pages read: 461

Total # of books for the year: 20.  It looks like I’m mostly out of my blogging slump.  I’ve even got a surprise planned for the Summer that you’ll get to find out more about later this month.  Now I just need to get back into writing reviews and coming up with other posts for the weekends again.

What are you reading this week?

“Monday’s Minutes” is a weekly post in which I track my bookish life.  All book covers are linked to Goodreads unless otherwise noted.
Current Reads:

• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith – for the Classic Club Spin.
• Inkdeath by Cornelia Funke
• The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice – for the Never-Ending Anne Rice Reading Challenge.
• The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente
• Mother Ocean, Daughter Sea by Diana Marcellas

  

 

Finished:

• The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

Challenges:

• Show Your Shelves Some Love: 15 out of 51

Total pages read: 461

Total # of books for the year: 20.  It looks like I’m mostly out of my blogging slump.  I’ve even got a surprise planned for the Summer that you’ll get to find out more about later this month.  Now I just need to get back into writing reviews and coming up with other posts for the weekends again.
What are you reading this week?

“Monday’s Minutes” is a weekly post in which I track my bookish life.  All book covers are linked to Goodreads unless otherwise noted.

Current Reads:

• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith – for the Classic Club Spin.
• The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien – for the #FanspeakTheRing Read-Along.
• Inkdeath by Cornelia Funke
• The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice – for the Never-Ending Anne Rice Reading Challenge.
• The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne M. Valente

  

 

Finished:

• The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
• Ms. Marvel, Vol. 1: No Normal by G. Willow Wilson
• Parnassus On Wheels by Christopher Morley

  

DNF:

• The Dragon Stone Trilogy by Kristian Alva

Challenges:

• Show Your Shelves Some Love: 15 out of 51

Total pages read: 505

Total # of books for the year: 19.  As much as I loved participating in Dewey’s 24 Hour Readathon, it wasn’t quite as fun for me as previous ones, and that has nothing to do with the wonderful and amazing people who organize and run the event.  It was entirely my fault.  I was concentrating so much on trying to get back into a reading groove, thinking that’s why I’ve been feeling so meh lately, that I didn’t even consider that it was the social aspect of blogging and readathoning that I’ve been missing.  I miss sharing my experiences with and my undying love of books with all of you.  However, every time I manage to find a little bit of time to sit down and write a review, I suddenly find myself uninterested and coming up with all the million other things I need to do.  Is this a blogging slump?!  If it is, then wow, does it suck.

Last year, I took time off because I was finishing my last semester of college and freaking out.  Earlier this year, I took time off because I had finally found a full-time job and I was freaking out.  Last month and most of this month, I took time off because I was in the middle of moving and was… freaking out.  Are you sensing a pattern?  Even though I’m freaking out about this, I’m not going to take more time off.  At least, not as long as I have recently.  Also, though it will look the same to all of you wonderful readers of my blog, it will be different.  Instead of taking a break and not writing anything, I’m going to take the next week or so to get organized again, plan, and write drafts.  Instead of being inactive, I’m going to be proactive.  You just won’t see the results until I start posting all those reviews and other things that I loved writing before this slump took my blogging mojo.

My Top Commenter: Vicky @ Books and Strips

What are you reading this week?

“Monday’s Minutes” is a weekly post in which I track my bookish life.  All book covers are linked to Goodreads unless otherwise noted.

Current Reads:

• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith – for the Classic Club Spin.
• The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien – for the #FanspeakTheRing Read-Along.
• Inkdeath by Cornelia Funke
• The Vampire Lestat by Anne Rice – for the Never-Ending Anne Rice Reading Challenge.

  

Challenges:

• Show Your Shelves Some Love: 12 out of 51

Total pages read: 270

Total # of books for the year: 16.  I thought I was in a reading slump until I started reading The Vampire Lestat on Friday night.  It turns out that the problem was A Tree Grows in Brooklyn.  It’s an excellent book, but it’s depressing and makes me think far too much about how my great grandparents and grandparents struggled to make a life for themselves.  Also, how there are people today who are still barely making ends meet, or even failing to do so.  Since my job makes me aware of that on a daily basis, I don’t want to be faced with it when I’m reading.  I might pick it back up during the readathon this weekend, but until then, I’m going to stick with what keeps me reading.

My Top Commenters: Thank you to everyone who stopped by to welcome me back and leave well wishes 🙂

What are you reading this week?

“Monday’s Minutes” is a weekly post in which I track my bookish life.  All book covers are linked to Goodreads unless otherwise noted.

Current Reads:

• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith – for the Classic Club Spin.
• The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien – for the #FanspeakTheRing Read-Along.
• Inkdeath by Cornelia Funke

  

Finished:

• The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith
• Crows and Cards by Joseph Helgerson

 

Challenges:

• Show Your Shelves Some Love: 12 out of 51

Total pages read: 643 – This is for the past couple of weeks and is just a guesstimate since I wasn’t keeping track of my pages read after my laptop went down.

Total # of books for the year: 16.  With everything going on, I haven’t done much reading.  There were several days in a row in which I didn’t read at all.  Every time I thought about picking up a book, all I could see were the boxes still needing to be unpacked and all the stuff that needed to be organized and put away.  No matter how smooth a move goes, it seems inevitable that some things get misplaced and end up being found in the most random of places.  I am not someone that handles that type of chaos very well, and so I couldn’t justify the reading time I desperately needed until most, if not all, of my new apartment was put in order.  I also had to get my laptop back up and running with a fresh install and then take the time to reinstall all the drivers and download what felt like endless updates.  I’m still not done since I need to transfer my files from my external hard drive and install all the programs I use.  On top of that, I’ve got a stomach bug that has kept me from doing much of anything, including running my weekly errands.  So, this week will probably be light on the reading as well, as I catch up with the grocery shopping, laundry, and other adult things that I wish I had the money to pay someone else to do so I could read.

My Top Commenter: Litha from Victorian Soul Book Critiques.

What are you reading this week?

“Monday’s Minutes” is a weekly post in which I track my bookish life.  All book covers are linked to Goodreads unless otherwise noted.

Current Reads:

• The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith
• Crows and Cards by Joseph Helgerson
• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith – for the Classic Club Spin.
• The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien – for the #FanspeakTheRing Read-Along.

  

Finished:

• The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
• Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman

 

Challenges:

• Show Your Shelves Some Love: 11 out of 51
• March TBR Challenge: 2

Total pages read: 880

Total # of books for the year: 14.

My Top Commenter: Shaina from Shaina Reads.

What are you reading this week?

“Monday’s Minutes” is a weekly post in which I track my bookish life.  All book covers are linked to Goodreads unless otherwise noted.

Current Reads:

• The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
• Bad Magic by Pseudonymous Bosch
• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith – for the Classic Club Spin.

  

Finished:

• An Echo in the Bone by Diana Gabaldon

Challenges:

• Show Your Shelves Some Love: 9 out of 51
• March TBR Challenge: 0

Total pages read: 554

Total # of books for the year: 12.  This past week was rough.  I’m behind on everything, or I feel like I’m struggling to keep up, and I’ve got so much more that has to get done during the limited hours when I’m not at work.  So many things are vying for my time and energy, and I just want to shut myself away in a quiet well-lit room when I don’t have a headache and do nothing but read my books and ignore the world outside of them.  With that being said, I will probably be taking an extended blogging break until mid-April.  I’ll still do my weekly Monday’s Minutes and #FitReaders Check-In posts, but if you don’t see anything else from me, it’s because there’s too much going on right now in my life.  The Boyfriend and I are moving the first week of April, and until our actual moving day, we’ll be busy sorting, organizing, and packing up our stuff and cleaning when we’re not working or sleeping.

My Top Commenter: Shaina from Shaina Reads.

What are you reading this week?