group discussion
topic:
50+ Books 2009 >
Angie's 75+ Challenge
Had to modify my goal, because it ended in Sept and I didn't meet it. So my 75 books is now over 15 months, LOL
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1) Twilight: 9th re-read. Loved it.
2) New Moon: 9th re-read. Loved it.
3) Eclipse: 8th re-read. Loved it.
4) Breaking Dawn: 3rd re-read. Loved it.
5) A Wrinkle in Time: Read this one with a student. I loved it. It is an easy read, yet very, very good.
6) Number the Stars: Read with an enrichment group. Excellent book, easy read. Dealt with difficult topics in a sensitive way for younger readers.
7) The Borrowers: Read with an enrichment group. Liked it, but did not love it. As a teacher, I found that it had very complex vocabulary that often left the enrichment group baffled (and sent me for a dictionary).
8) Bud, Not Buddy: Read with an enrichment group. Liked it, but did not love it. Well written, an easy read, but just a tad dry for me.
9) Rules: Read with a student. Loved the book. Dealt with difficult topics in a light and humorous way.
10) Drums, Girls, and Dangerous Pie: Read in preparation to read with a student. Loved it. Such difficult topics in the book, but they are presented in a sensitive, and often humorous way, that kept me from jumping off the roof of the house.
11) Dead Until Dark: Loved it. Like Twilight, only naughty.
12) Living Dead in Dallas: Loved it. See previous note.
13) Speak: Loved it. A really sad book, but so well done.
14) Gracias a Winn Dixie: Read to practice my spanish. I liked it just as much in Spanish as I did in English.
15) Coraline: Loved it. Super spooky. Easy read
16) Club Dead: Did not liked it as much as the other two, but I faithfully read it to ensure that I was prepared for book four(incidentally, reading book 4 now and loving it).
19) Definitely Dead: Sluggish beginning, but second half of the book more than made up for it. Loved it.
20) All Together Dead: Loved it.
21) From Dead to Worse: Loved it.
Had so much fun during break. I will definitely be moving at a slower pace now that the little people come back to school tomorrow.
22) The Graveyard Book: Home with strep today, and this entertained me. REALLY GREAT BOOK. Not as easy a read as Coraline (a touch more of a thinker), but even better. Absolutely loved it and can't wait to read it again.
23) The Hunger Games: Thanks Jessm for lending me the book! One of the more frightening books I have ever read. Really loved it, and I can TOTALLY see this as having the potential to be a fabulous movie. I hope someone gets that brilliant idea!
26) Blizzard of the Blue Moon. This is one of the Magic Tree House books. While "A Wrinkle in Time" it's not, I hold Mary Pope Osborne in the highest regard for knowing her audience. She composes chapter books (in the 100-200 page range) for primary grade readers and, in those books, exhibits a knowledge of phonetic and vocabulary awareness as it pertains to young readers. Working within the limitations of what you can write with limited vocabulary, MPO creates fantastical worlds which captivate young children (if not the older teacher, LOL). However, even as a mature reader, I can appreciate the simple charm of the books, and enjoy the time and space travels that are the focus of the series.
27) Eclipse... Yes again. For the 10th time.
28) Dark Day in the Deep Sea. Another Magic Tree House book I am reading with my students.
29) Graceling. Usually not my genre, but I really loved it! Katsa is so strong. Adored Po. And the build up between the two had me needing a cold shower...
On the topic of hotness, three different series, all having some sort of weird hold on me...
1) Twilight. The first three books were undeniably chaste, yet I was left with the incredible urge to sprinkle glitter on David to see if I could re-create the butterflies it induced in my stomach.
2) Sookie books. I think I blushed while I read those books. Felt a little dirty, in a very good way.
3) Graceling. A little more racy than Twilight, a little more innocent than Sookie's stories, but so, so, so hot.
30) The Giver. Loved it. Really great book. Something Hunger Games/Gracelingesque about it. A very concise book, easy to read, but an intriguing topic. A Newbery winner to boot.
SPOILER ALERT! FOR ANYONE WHO HAS NOT READ THE GIVER:
Yes, I LOVE The Giver too. I've read it and taught it with middle school kids and high school kids. I even had a friend read it in a college class. The themes to discuss are endless. My favorite part of teaching it is when you read the end, and I always ask them what happened. 90% of the kids always come to the happy conclusion they are wanting at the end of that sled ride, but there is always this one little brave kid who raises his hand and says quietly, "I think that..." I won't write it here to spoil it for everyone else, but it's always been one of my favorite parts of the unit. Kids get so passionate about it. It's great.
Have you read the other two books that follow it? I haven't but have always wanted to. They came out after I stopped teaching middle school, so I just never got around to it.
Something else funny about The Giver. Ever since I've had kids, the word that automatically comes to mind when I think of or describe the bears they sleep with at night (daughter has a polar bear, son has a raggedy brown bear and a tattered blanket), I always think of them as "comfort objects." It sort of creeps me out, yet really, that's what they are! :)
SPOILER ALERT!!! DON'T READ TILL YOU FINISH THE GIVER!!!
I know!!! The ending leaves much up to interpretation. Have you ever read Lois Lowry's FAQ about whether or not that brave kid was right?
I can't wait till we read it in May. I would love to hear everyone's theories about the ending, whether the adults are bad or good, where did the animals go...etc.
Yes, I've read something on it (ie. the ending), but it has been a long time ago. I'll probably dig out my old files when I reread it. Or maybe I can check her website.
31) Anne Frank: Diary of a Young Girl. Obviously, a very powerful piece. I haven't read this since I was Anne's age and the effect on me this time around was very different than the first time I read it. It was captivating, yet, at several points I just wanted to stop reading it because of the inevitability of the ending. You know you can't change it, but somehow, you just wish...
32) Medianoche en la Luna: Un libro de la serie La Casa del Arbol. Es un libro por los niños, pero por una idiota, como yo, es bastante facil.
33) The Lovely Bones: Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. But really good.
Ahenry wrote: "33) The Lovely Bones: Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. But really good."
Cheer up, Angie. :) I read The Lovely Bones when it first came out years ago. My daughter was just born, and I was so emotional. It is wonderful and is written so well, but man...it's a tough one to digest emotionally. I own it and have always wanted to reread it, but I just can't seem to do it.
Thanks all. That was such a difficult one.
BTW... anyone object to fanfic? I just read the 47 chaper Wide Awake and loved it! It is the first fanfic I have been able to read to completion (well, technically there are 3 more chapters, but she hasn't released them yet). If so...
34) Wide Awake. Okay, looking past the obvious flaws any amateur is going to make (grammar, syntax, etc), this was just soooo good. It does stand up to its M rating (I should put it out there that it really, really, really deserves the M rating) but there is an amazing plot line there that sucks you in chapters and chapters and chapters before there is so much of a kiss to be had. Even though it thoroughly deserves the M rating, it is done in a really sweet way between people who are just crazy about each other.
I have to say, I was really snotty about FF before, because JUST SO MUCH OF IT IS SO BAD and I never get past a few chapters, but this one is so different. If you aren't adversed to the idea of FF, I highly recommend this one. However, ahem, you may want a significant other, or a cold shower close at hand....
No, but I'm going to based on your reco! I did a quick peeksie on the later chapters and ummm, you ain't kidding. Definite "M" for sure! *blushes and vigorously fans myself*
So where do you exactly find the fanfic? What does "M" stand for? Is it like an "R" or "X" rating for a film?
I'm not going to lie to you Lisarenee, it truly is like an X rating for a film.
Like I said, I am not usually a fanfic person, and I generally avoid M ratings because they are trash 90% of the time. I stumbled on this one by accident, looking for New Moon set photos. Someone had linked it as 'the best fanfic ever'. I was kind of like "right", but went to check it out. Then I saw this girl had pages and pages of reviews and even had an article in the Baltimore Examiner. So I started reading. About 10 chapters into it, I couldn't even understand why it had an M rating, because nothing illicit had happened. I don't read a lot of FF so I thought maybe all grown-up fanfic was rated that way. By that time I was thoroughly hooked and kept on reading.
But yes! As I read I did stumble upon the first "OOOOHHHH, this is why it is rated M." But by that point there was no going back, I was too invested in the story. At the completion, there were plenty of chapters that warranted an M rating. I will say (without trying to give the plot away), that the sexual encounters described (in great, great detail) in the fanfic are not casually done. Neither are they absentminded f*cking that I hear plagues fanfics. You are emotionally invested in the characters and their relationship and in many ways it is really, really sweet. However, if the idea of reading what truly does deserve the equivalent of an X rating on a movie bothers you, I would not read this one.
The link is here http://angstgoddess003.livejournal.com/. The chapters are on the left hand side of the page.
35) Breaking Dawn: Fourth time through. Truthfully, there were things I could have done without (Renesmee was fine, but I could have done with or without her) and things I wished were different (Volturi defeat, Jacob with Leah, more of that breathless romance between B&E). However, there were so many things I loved that I truly do love the book as a whole. SPOILERS!!! The wedding was perfect, the honeymoon was sexy, loved Jacob's POV and chapter titles, Bella's transformation was everything I hoped for, I loved the first hunt, and OME those last pages were wonderful. Overall, loved it.
36) Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone: A re-read with my children (bedtime). Teared up again at the end with Dumbledore's House Cup speech. Sniff.
37) Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing: Read this with an enrichment group. A good book, and one of the few (it seems - I know I am exaggerating) that seems to appeal to young boys. The group enjoyed it, and I did too.
38) A Wrinkle in Time: Second time through. Read this with an enrichment group. Although this is a book for children, it is still one of my favorites.
39) The Tale of Despereaux: Second time through. Read this with an enrichment group as well. Another great choice for adults, though it is a children's book. I love the style in which it is written (the narrator talks to the reader...i.e. "Reader, picture if you will...") In addition to it being a great book and unusually narrated, it does not follow the normal forward motion of stories. Instead, it jumps back and forth, interweaving events until it brings them all together in the end. It truly makes young kids think about what they are reading.
40) Dead and Gone: (SPOILERS)
I enjoyed this book in the way that I enjoy most Sookie books. It keeps my attention up to the very end. I enjoy the angst and drama that drives them. So, on that level, I liked it fairly well.
However, I was really unhappy with a few things. I felt like this book was a really great (great meaning enjoyable) waste, if that contradiction in terms makes sense at all. After the last book, I really felt that we were going to see something with the nephew Hunter in this book. Nada. I felt like we may get more direction in Sookie's love life. Zip. In fact, the one interlude with Eric I felt was devoid of any emotion for me at all. I imagine you could go from last book to whatever book comes next and miss nothing, because short of one thing, nothing really happened. That said, the fluff it was filled with was the usual action and drama that I liked. I just really want to sit down with Harris and say, "You know girl, you have kind of said what you wanted to say. Plan the next book as though it is your last. Make it good. Make it count."
One thing I was really happy about...I like that they are closing off the whole fairy thing. The supe world was getting way too crowded for me.
I hope this doesn't sound too harsh. I really did like all the action and drama in the book. I just feel like there was no great plot to hold it all together.
Angie, I agree with you on all your points. Jenn (not Awww Yeaaahhh) and I both read the book and felt let down. Plus we're a little upset about all the knocking around Sookie gets. She really needs to take some self defense courses! That said I am addicted to the series and will continue to read the next book and hope for more answers. I can't believe the nephew was hardly mentioned. I wonder if she wrote the book and forgot about him and at the last moment decided, "Oh! Maybe I should make some mention of him." and then proceeded to add what? Maybe 4 sentences or so about him? I totally felt the book was unfinished. On the other hand I want answers and can't wait for the next book! That must have been Harris' devious evil plan! Darn her!!!!!! :)
41) The Witch of Blackbird Pond. Wow. What a good book. This is one of those I always meant to read, but hadn't till this point. I really enjoyed it.
42) City of Bones. I really liked this book. I was so sad about the twist, but I have some theories that make it okay.
43) City of Ashes. For the most part, loved this book. The exception is the sheer number (and names) of different bad guys and weapons. My little brain had a hard time absorbing all that. I was really hoping my theory would come to fruition in this book, but it didn't. However, I have a lot more evidence to pad my hypothesis. I adore both Jace and Simon, BTW. Can't choose!! Onto book three.
Oh, Angie! I can't wait for you to finish City of Glass! I LOVE it very much, as you can tell from the many posts I have put on here about this series. To fully appreciate the books, I think you have to read the entire trilogy. I can't wait to hear what you think!
Ahenry wrote: "K... but could I see him on weekends perhaps? Like visitation rights."
Angie, I'm sorry, but...NO!
I totally gave all of you full custody of Edward Cullen. I just want Jace. All. To. Myself. :)
45) Princess Academy. This Newbery winner by Shannon Hale has been on my desk since last summer and I am so glad I spent a couple sunny days reading this last weekend. I liked it very much.
Woohoo! NO SCHOOL!!!!!!!!!!!!
Oh, and about that sharing thing...you did read that I totally gave up any rights or visition with Eddie, right? I'm serious! :)
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Books mentioned in this topic
Breaking Dawn (other topics)New Moon (other topics)
The Graveyard Book (other topics)
The Hunger Games (other topics)
Jekel Loves Hyde (other topics)
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