FAREWELL MAY [recap]

I know we all always say we can’t believe it’s almost *month* and time is flying by, but this year has been really insane for me so in some ways it seems to be at warp speed and in others it’s crawling by. At the beginning of this year, I could not fathom making it more than a day at a time but now I’ve made it to all the way to the end of MAY? *Cue Britney’s “Stronger”*

Reading has definitely played a huge part in getting me through this rough patch, like it has all the other rough patches I’ve gone through. Characters in ridiculously opposite situations can have incredibly similar emotional battles that can make you do some much needed, if uncomfortable, examining and it can DO THINGS. I really love books, you all.

Anyway.

I didn’t do the greatest job of keeping up with what I read in May and I’m not sure why that happened. I blame Overdrive for some of it, because I pick random romance reads and get partway through and then I’m like “ha, nope” then I forget which ones I actually read and which ones I didn’t. Smooth. A list, probably missing some books and definitely missing DNF’s:

• for class: All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque -wow.
• We Were Liars by E. Lockhart – I have a post for this drafted!
• The Winner’s Curse by Maria Rutkoski
• Love Letters to the Dead by Ava Dellaira
• The Geography of You and Me by Jennifer E Smith
• Where’d You Go, Bernadette? by Maria Semple
• The Passage by Justin Cronin – I finished this book!!! I would like to thank Andi from Estella’s Revenge for her comment on my other post, because it really encouraged me during moments when this book felt insurmountable for some reason. I actually really enjoyed it and really want to read the next one soon!
• All Lined Up by Cora Cormack
• Just One Night by Gayle Forman

 

I only posted 5 times in May, oops:

• DNF: Twisted by Holly Hook and The Here and Now by Ann Brashares
• To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before by Jenny Han [thoughts]
• Second Star by Alyssa B. Sheinmel [thoughts]
• Life and Books [an update]
• One Man Guy by Michael Barakiva [thoughts]

Some bookish plans:

• I’ve got Star Cursed by Jessica Spotswood, the second book in The Cahill Witch Chronicles checked out from the library. I didn’t LOVE the first one but I’m interested enough to want to know what happens to the sisters.
• I’ve got all 3 books of the Razorland by Ann Aguirre series checked out, too! I read the first one after it came out, but haven’t read the other two and I’m excited about them!
• Nantucket Red by Leila Howland is ready for me at the library but I’m going to wait until Monday to grab it, I’m really excited about this one. I really enjoyed Nantucket Blue!
• I went ahead and downloaded The Twelve by Justin Cronin on Overdrive, I’m not sure how long it will take me to get through!
• I’m also determined to read more of The Dark Tower series! SOON. I need to stop getting library books and make myself read them!

How was your May? What was your favorite book read in May? Did you have any awesome posts I missed and should check out? (I am working on commenting and earlier I brilliantly marked MY WHOLE BLOGLOVIN FEED as read instead of the group I was on. I am positive it’s BL’s fault and not mine but I’m sad because now I can’t sort as easily!) Tell me what’s up with you!

Farewell November!

You know how every year people say the year flew by? Most years, I kind of just agree while thinking it dragged by. This year really did fly by for me! I can’t believe it’s almost December!

November was a bit busy, which is why my posting slowed down, oops. I am working on scheduling posts for the last two dreadful weeks of my classes!

November highlights:

• My birthday (on the 23rd)! It was low key, but I saw CF and got to spend time with one of my best friends!
• Catching Fire: on my birthday! I have problems with some of the cast, but Jenn is so perfect and overall it was a great movie and a fun experience. I only cried about 5 times, I think.
• I finished my short class with an A and had one less thing to worry about.

Books read – I kind of lost count because my Nexus broke. I need to make a book resolution about keeping better track of books I read.

• The Book Thief by Markus Zusak – the pain! I think a post on this is coming. Maybe.
• The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams – I’m not sure if I’ll review this one, but I didn’t love it as much as I expected I would.
• Meant to Be by Lauren Morrill – review to come
• World After by Susan Ee, after rereading Angelfall – not sure I’ll review this one either
• Vicious by V.E. Schwab – review to come
• Currently reading Blythewood by Carol Goodman

Posts (so few, oops):

• Just One Year by Gayle Forman [book review]
• Tiger Lily by Jodi Lynn Anderson [book review]
• Fangirl by Rainbow Rowell [book review]
• The Dream Thieves by Maggie Stiefvater [book review]
• Top Ten Bookish Things I Am Thankful For

Current excitement:

• The semester ending soon!
• My Christmas tumblr, and if you have a tumblr and like Christmas scenes/movies/episode/specials, you should check it out!
• Christmas shopping for loved ones! I have no idea what to get anyone but I’m excited.
• Christmas everything, lights, decorations, music, family!

So far I’ve only ordered two books with holiday deals, but I’m still planning!

• I preordered These Broken Stars, because of how many great things I’ve seen about it. If I end up not liking it I might cry because I never preorder things unless I’m pretty sure!
• I ordered Fortunately, the Milk for my niecelets! I might get them The Day the Crayons Quit, too. Are there any others I should look into? Chapter book suggestions for a 7yo would be welcome, too!
• I might order a copy of The Scorpio Races because I love it but don’t have a copy. I also need a physical copy of Daughter of Smoke & Bone and a few other books, so I might keep an eye out for deals and coupons. It is really difficult for me to buy books I haven’t read!
• I’ve been contemplating buying my sister some books as gifts, but I think I’ll just make her read ones I already have and progress from there.

What about you? Did anything great happen in November? Did you see/love Catching Fire? Read any spectacular books? Did I miss a really great post? Are you excited for Christmas, or if you do not celebrate it, winter break/winter in general? Are you excited for anything else? Did you do any shopping yet? Any good books/book deals? Feel free to share all!

Goodbye October! [recap]

October has been really intense because of my month long class (a Mythology class that I actually really enjoy, it’s just a LOT packed into a month) and my 8 week class (Biology, blah) starting. Plus, the most fun issue of repeated car problems! I still read a lot, though!

Books read:

• Elemental series by Brigid Kemmerer, I didn’t really like these but kept reading anyway. As one does, you know. I skimmed #3 and felt like I should’ve just stopped. I don’t plan on reviewing them.
• I read a lot of romance books on Overdrive, and some of them I skimmed and DNF’d, but I read the whole Stanslaski series (I actually read them backwards and it was kind of fun that way) and the 4 MacKade books by Nora Roberts. I liked the Stanislaski series more than the MacKade. They weren’t perfect but were easy to read and fun.
• Just One Year by Gayle Forman – I have a review drafted for this, hopefully I’ll finish and post it soon. I also reread Just One Day to remember everything.
• Crown of Midnight by Sarah J Maas –
• Fangirl by Ranbow Rowell
• I reread Divergent and Insrugent very quickly and read Allegiant really slowly. I’ve got a drafted review on that one, too.

Posts in October (not very many, oops!)

• Review: Aristotle and Dante
• Review: The Historian
• Review: Juliet, Naked
• Top Ten Tuesday: Forced Reads
• Review: The Miseducation of Cameron Post
• Review: The Archived
• Blog Tour Review and GIVEAWAY: Muckers
• Busy Blogger Explanation

Hopefully, I will be able to whip out reviews soon, even if they are shorter and hopefully less rambling than usual!

Also, I have a post on bookish tumblr posts in my drafts, but since everyone is going to be slipping into Christmas mode, I want to inform anyone that has a tumblr (or just likes looking at gifs and pretty things) and likes Christmas that I have an awesome Christmas tumblr, which just reblogs posts from Christmas movies, TV specials, and TV episodes. It’s not active at the moment, but there’s a nice tagging system to help people find what they’re looking for!

I am (as always) trying to catch up on commenting, but feel free to leave links for me to visit! Direction can be nice =)

Goodbye September! [recap]

September went by so fast!

Posts in September:

• The Secret History of the Pink Carnation by Lauren Willig 
• The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
• Top Ten Books I Would Love To See As A Movie/TV Show
• Pivot Point by Kasie West
• The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K. Le Guin
• Top Ten Books On My Fall 2013 TBR List
• Scarlet by A.C. Gaughen
• Out of the Easy by Ruta Sepetys
• Fake Book Premises Inspired by Songs
• The Liebster Award

So 5 reviews and 10 posts overall for September. I have to get better about knocking reviews out!

Books Read in September:

1. I read 3-8 of the Pink Carnation series. There was skimming involved with a few of them. I’m not going to review the rest. I liked some more than others.
2. I also read 2-5 of the Percy Jackson series. I enjoyed them but I don’t plan on reviewing them. They were really quick reads!
3. Juliet, Naked by Nick Hornby
4. The Miseducation of Cameron Post by Emily M Danforth
5. The Dream Thieves – by Maggie Stiefvater – Probably my favorite read of 2013 so far.
6. Tiger Lily by Jodi Lynn Anderson
7. Rose Under Fire by  Elizabeth Wein
8. I read some Cicero for a class. Blahhhhh
9. I reread The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K Le Guin

Before blogging, I used to mark books as read on Goodreads as soon as I was finished and now I don’t ever do it that way. I need to at least write down what I read. Those are the books that will (hopefully) be reviewed, but not all of the Pink Carnation series or the Percy Jackson series.

Goodreads:
I’m not really sure what to do about Goodreads. I don’t like what they did, but the site is useful. I think it has the most information about books. I haven’t really decided yet, but for now I’m still going to link to them. I’m pretty lazy about posting reviews on Goodreads anyway, so I might just wait to make an actual decision. Maybe I’ll check out some of the other options, but I’m not sure.

I’ve been trying to catch up on commenting! I keep making some progress then getting overwhelmed, distracted, or lost in a book. If I’ve missed you lately, leave me a link! How was your September??

Goodbye August!

I usually don’t do recaps but I haven’t posted a lot lately and there are a few things I’d like to mention, so I will give it a go! I’ve didn’t really post that much and that had a lot to do with August being busier and August being kind of awful. Here’s hoping September is a lot better for me in general and as a blogger!

A few bloggish things:

• I’m sure most people that follow me know about my new feature and the first post that went up yesterday! The lovely Wendleberry from Marvel at Words talks about who influenced her to read! I love her story and really enjoyed emailing with her about the post! I’m excited to see more of her reviews because I felt like she was pretty spot on with her review of The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach! I’m really thankful that she participated in A Reader Who and I would love it if you would, too! If you’re interested you can check out the page and fill out the form!
• I wrote a guest post for the lovely Lauren at Books, Tea and Me! Lauren’s blog is one of my favorites and she is one of the nicest bloggers I’ve met, so I was happy to write a post while she’s away on vacation this week! My post is about books that make you cry because I love sad books! Harry Potter, His Dark Materials, Anne of Green Gables and If I Stay/Where She Went are all mentioned. She also has some other great guests on the blog! If you’re not already following Lauren, you should definitely check out her blog!

Last week was Bout of Books and it was fun! I’m having a few issues (=laziness, books are due back at library, other reading) reviewing the books I read, oops. There were so many nice people involved in Bout of Books and I wasn’t nearly as social as I should have been but I’m glad I’m connected with these two:

• Danielle at The Book Barn – I randomly decided to visit her blog out of the huge linky list because of her blog name and I found ASOIAF reviews! I think I’ve mentioned how much I like the series in passing on the blog, but my love for it has been downplayed. I couldn’t resist commenting with feelings on Danielle’s review of A Storm of Swords and telling her she’s not at all alone in Arya/Gendry feelings! Not only does Danielle like Ice and Fire, she’s a really nice blogger!
• Charlene at Cheap Thrills – Charlene was a commenting powerhouse during Bout of Books! If I visited a blog, I usually saw comments from her. She was encouraging and insightful!

I didn’t post that much in August but I actually read a nice amount. I’m not completely sure on the dates for some (I need to keep better track of that!) so I left some I think might have been July reads off:

• When You Were Here by Daisy Whitney (review here)
• Pivot Point by Kasie West
• The Archived by Victoria Schwab
• Scarlet by A.C. Gaughen
• The Secret History of the Pink Carnation by Lauren Willig
• Out of the Easy by Ruta Sepetys
• The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield
• The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordan
• Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Alire Sáenz
• The Masque of the Black Tulip by Lauren Willig

I feel like I’m leaving some off but I’m still happy with ten books, so it’s okay!

I should be better at keeping track of posts and discussions I like and will try to make an effort to do this. This month I’ve been behind of everything it seems, so I’m catching up on commenting today! If you have an awesome post that I’ve missed or one that just needs more love, feel free to send it my way! I’m also determined to write most of at least a few reviews. I always write it then I have to read it another day to make sure nothing sounds too stupid, ha!

Do you have a recap post? Do you like recap posts? (I like reading other people’s a lot, I’m not sure how I feel about my own yet!) Did you have a good August? I hope it was better than mine!