Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

Seasons Greetings and a Merry Christmas to everyone!! It has been one wild year. The week between Christmas and New Years always brings a time of reflection and a time of planning. It has been a busy year for my family. I am trying to get through school (just about a year left with going part-time). Finals were not so bad this year, the kids are getting better at letting me study. I am still trying to find a good program to put my daughter in next year. She has disabilities and needs to be in a good work/study program to prepare her for getting a job once she graduates from high school (which she won't do until she is 21). This gives her time to get through programs offered by the public school system. My son has just started High School this year, so that has been quite a challenge. Learning responsibility for his own studies and homework has been difficult. But he made it through first semester finals with flying colors! My other son started Kindergarten this year and that has been a big step in his young life. And my youngest son started preschool and is absolutely thriving in that atmosphere. He definitely needed the challenge in order to keep is active mind occupied.

Doesn't look like I am going to meet my 100 books this year. I have a few books that I have started and hope to have finished by the end of the year, but that will only bring my number to 95. I'm not complaining - 95 is a good number, and like I said before, I don't want to get so wrapped up in numbers that I begin rushing through books just to meet my challenge (or the challenges that I have signed up for next year). I want to enjoy my reads and take the time to live through the authors eyes and take a pause to dwell in their worlds.

So, in looking back over the year, with my own schooling, my children, and everyday events that take over our lives, I feel between what I read on my book list and what I read on my erotic romance list - I haven't done too bad.

In looking ahead to next year, since I didn't meet my goal of 100, I am keeping next year's goal to 100 too. I think I will be able to meet this (and possibly more) with the Challenges that I have joined. I have a lot of overlap, but that is good too. I am also reviewing for Fallen Angel Reviews and hopefully will start helping them with edits. So next year looks to be an exciting year for reading. I am ready to jump in and start my challenges on January 1, as I have a lot of books that I have been anxious to get reading.

Here is hoping that everyone's holidays are happy and safe. May the new year bring you your dreams, hopes, desires, and great reads!!!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

http://worldaccordingtobooks.blogspot.com/2007/12/merry-christmas-and-happy-new-year.html

Challenges

So here's the deal. I have joined 7 Challenges. I know I said I wasn't going to join many but 7 it turned out to be. My justification for this is I still have my goal of reading 100 books a year - and I was thinking of increasing this number by 10 or 20 for the year 2008. So, having these challenges to do will help me reach my goal. (Sounds good anyway - LOL).

All my challenges are listed in the sidebar with links to the originators and a link to my Challenges blog. I am thinking of reviewing all my Challenge books over on that blog with links posted here. My usual reviews of all the other books will still be here. I don't know - maybe I should keep all my reviews here with links posted on the other blog. What do you think?

Anyhoo - I am done joining - I think 7 is enough for my first year. I am excited about them - I think it will be a real challenge to myself and it will be interesting to read outside the genres that I normally do. Like I said before, I will always love my romances, but it is time to broaden my horizens, as they say.

Happy reading to all,

Challenges

http://worldaccordingtobooks.blogspot.com/2007/12/challenges.html

Wordless Wednesday #7

Wordless Wednesday #7

http://worldaccordingtobooks.blogspot.com/2007/12/wordless-wednesday-7.html

Anita Blake Does it Again

I've finished another Anita Blake book, Bloody Bones and it was fantastic as usual. This time she is up against Serephina, the Master Vampire of Branson, Missouri; the Fae; and a goblin from an old fairy tale (Ireland), Bloody Bones. She's been contracted to raise two-hundred-year-old corpses to settle a land dispute. However, newer deaths vie for her attention. She needs to contact the Master of the City in Branson and the only way to do that - Jean-Claude. Of course, she kicks butt again. The other situation is her continuing relationship with Jean-Claude and Richard. Richard doesn't play a role in this book as he did last time, but Jean-Claude is a major character. Throughout the book Anita is beginning to realize that maybe Jean-Claude isn't the monster she made him out to be...then again maybe he is.

Here are some quotes from the book:

"If there was nothing I could do to prevent it, might as well not worry about it. Worry about the things you can control; the rest will either work themselves out, or they'll kill you. Either way, no more worries."

"Never look back; something is always gaining on you."

"There is no real safety. Innocence lost can never be regained."

Also, Laurell Hamilton wrote an Afterward at the end. She discusses her life at the time she wrote the book, her ideas about the upcoming books, and some reflection on events in her life. There is a quote I would like to share that spoke to me:

"For divorce is also a kind of death. A death of what you thought your life would be, and who it would be with, and who you thought that person was, and who they turned out to be. And who you turned out to be."

Explains it rather well, I think....

Anita Blake Does it Again

http://worldaccordingtobooks.blogspot.com/2007/12/anita-blake-does-it-again.html

Notable Books Challenge

Okay, I couldn't help myself on this one - Good ole' Wendy from the last post is hosting a Notable Books Challenge. This is where you choose notable books from a variety of lists (National Book Critics Circle, New York Times 2007 Most Notable, Publisher's Weekly Best Books 2007, and a few more). They can all be seen here.

So, I have accepted the challenge and here are my list of books (a couple overlap with Man Booker but that is okay).

2007 New York Times Most Notable

1. The Gathering by Anne Enright
2. On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan
3. Circling My Mother by Mary Gordon (Non-Fiction)
4. The Beautiful Things That Heaven Knows by Dinaw Mengestu
5. How Doctors Think by Jerome Groopman (Non-Fiction)
6. Call Me By Your Name by Andre Aciman
7. The Brief Wonderous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
8. The Father of All Things by Tom Bissell
9. Outstealing Horses by Per Petterson

Publisher's Weekly Best Books 2007

10. The Winter Lodge by Susan Wiggs
11. What the Dead Know by Laura Lippman
12. One With the Shadows by Susan Squires

I am really excited about these challenges - I am still a die-hard romance reader and always will be, but I want to return to reading other genres again.

This will be it for me though because I still have to read for reviewing. I mentioned that I am reviewing for Fallen Angel Reviews, but I am also starting to review for TwoLips Reviews.

Notable Books Challenge

http://worldaccordingtobooks.blogspot.com/2007/12/notable-books-challenge.html

Book Challenge

Okay, so I was taking time out to get caught up on all the blogs I read and was over at Carolyn Jean's The Thrillionth Page (great blog, by the way) and I clicked on her Blog Advent Calendar and went to the blog that was featured today: Wendy at Caribousmom. She has joined a book challenge that really intrigued me.

It is called the Man Booker Prize Challenge where you read 6 books in the year 2008 of any Man Booker Award winner - it also includes the shortlist and longlist books. This is being hosted by Dewey at The Hidden Side of a Leaf. I have wanted to broaden my reading again (I used to read the classics and really enjoyed them) and thought this would be a great way to go about it. I don't want to join too many challenges as I have one going on through Shelfari where I have challenged myself into reading 100 books this year. I plan to keep going with that next year and maybe increase the number. I don't want to increase it too much as I am afraid I will start rushing through books and not enjoying them like I should.

However, to get with the times and see what other great writers are out there (besides romance and paranormal authors), I have decided to challenge myself with this. So.......



Here is my list:

1. The Gathering by Anne Enright (2007 Winner)
2. Holiday by Stanley Middleton (1974 Winner)
3. The Life of Pi by Yann Martel (2002 Winner)
4. The Bone People by Keri Hulme (1985 Winner)
5. Hotel du Lac by Anita Bookner (1984 Winner)
6. The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro (1989 Winner)

I will follow up with my thoughts on these books as I read them.

I have decided to start a new blog with all my challenges instead of doing them here. It is at Kara's Book Challenges.

Book Challenge

http://worldaccordingtobooks.blogspot.com/2007/12/book-challenge.html